Tag Archives: Homs

What is the UN Saying on Syria?

June 5, 2013 at 1:15 PM
Sunjeev Bery on Sky News Arabia

Sunjeev Bery on Sky News Arabia

Yesterday, I joined the team at Sky News Arabia for a live discussion of the latest report on Syria by an independent UN panel. Special thanks to Sky News producer Arwa Sawan, reporter Joseph Khawly, and anchor Amer Abdel Aziz for giving Amnesty International USA an opportunity to share our analysis of the grave human rights situation.

The report (PDF) is a catalog of violence, suffering, and geopolitical developments, focusing on events between January 15th and May 15th of this year. It was produced by the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic, established by the UN Human Rights Council in 2011.

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Syria: A Tale of Five Women

March 6, 2012 at 4:18 PM
Women activists in London for Syria

Activists gather in London to support Syria protesters.

Here is a tale of five women in Syria.  One is Asma al-Assad, As First Lady of Syria, she has long portrayed herself as a champion of women and children’s rights.  In 2008, she assured the world that women and girls in Syria were protected with equal rights. She said:

“We all deserve the same thing.  We should all be able to live in peace, stability and with our dignities. … It’s a simple basic human right.”

As her husband’s military and security forces launches a wave of repression throughout the country, Asma al-Assad, however, has done little to protect women.

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Homs at Gunpoint: Satellites Track Assault on Syrian Cities

March 3, 2012 at 10:00 AM
Field Guns Cropped

Field guns deployed at the Shinshar artillery base oriented towards Homs. DigitalGlobe Natural Color Image, Feb. 22, 2012, Shinshar artillery base, Shinshar, Syria, 34 36 23N 36 45 08E

Syrian authorities are continuously escalating tactics to ensure a complete media blackout, as witnessed last week by their deadly attack on a makeshift media center in Homs that killed and wounded several foreign journalists. To counter that blackout, Amnesty has secured satellite imagery to track developments on the ground and document human rights violations.

The images from Homs and Hama show clearly that armed forces have not been removed from residential areas, as demanded by the U.N. General Assembly resolution from mid February. In Hama, the images reveal an increase in military equipment over the last weeks, raising the specter of an impending assault on the city where the father of current President Bashar al-Assad unleashed a bloody 27-day assault three decades ago, with as many as 25,000 people killed. With reports of a ground assault underway in Homs, the analysis of imagery identifies military equipment and checkpoints throughout Homs, and field guns and mortars actively deployed and pointing at Homs. Additionally, the images show the shelling of residential areas in Homs, concentrated on the Bab ‘Amr neighborhood. Artillery impact craters are visible in large sections of Bab ‘Amr, from where we have received the names of hundreds killed throughout the period of intense shelling.

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From Syria: 'I'm Not Afraid of Dying. What I Fear is Being Arrested'

February 29, 2012 at 10:37 AM
Syrian refugees protest in Amman

Syrian women protest in Jordan's capital Amman. © KHALIL MAZRAAWI/AFP/Getty Images

You have heard the stories on the news — Syrian cities are being besieged, and civilians are dying in droves at the hands of their own government.

Last week, a U.S. journalist and a French photographer were killed while covering the violence in Homs. Despite the Syrian government’s refusal to allow independent international human rights monitors into the country, Amnesty International is on the Syrian border, collecting stories for the world to hear.

Amnesty’s Syria campaigner Maha talked with a group of women from the village of Tasil, including a young mother:

“One day before we left Tasil I was looking out from the window and saw security forces chasing a man in the farms near the village. They were shooting at him and I thought no doubt they would kill him. When I looked closely I realized that that man was actually my husband. Thank God he managed to escape.”

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Syria's Deadly Assault on Homs

February 13, 2012 at 11:10 AM

Demonstrate: For a Human Rights Revolution MENA SyriaThe death toll continues to rise in Syria. Hundreds of largely unarmed people have reportedly been killed in the city of Homs alone. The crisis in Syria is escalating.

The world must do everything in its power to end the Assad regime’s violent crackdown. Instead, Russia, a country with influence over Syria, appears to be standing by while crimes against humanity are being committed.

We all need to demand that Russia put real pressure on Syrian authorities to end the military assault on Homs.

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5 Countries Where Your Online Comments Could Land You in Jail

November 15, 2011 at 8:05 PM

free jabbar savalan facebook page

When you log onto Facebook, you might expect to hear from long-lost friends or to see pictures from the latest family reunion. Maybe you follow Amnesty on Facebook or Twitter, read and comment on this blog, or keep a blog yourself.

But when you log off at the end of the day, you probably don’t expect the police to come knocking on your door. For people in some countries, that’s exactly what can happen. A 2011 study by Freedom House examining 37 countries found that 23 of them had arrested a blogger or internet user for their online posts. These encroachments on internet freedom – regardless of laws – come at a time of explosive growth in the number of internet users worldwide. Governments are clearly terrified because they know that information is power.

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