Syrian general Hashem urges action to stop ‘genocide’
One of the most prominent critics of the Syrian regime, a former high-ranking officer in the Syrian army, has called for urgent international military intervention to stop what he called the “barbaric genocide” being committed by government forces in his country.
In a talk at Britain’s House of Commons on Thursday, Brig-Gen Aqil Hashem said more than 15,000 people had now been killed in Syria, and that the only way out of the conflict was for the world’s militaries to intervene.
Speaking to a packed audience of MPs, diplomats, journalists and others at a seminar hosted by the Henry Jackson Society think-tank, Gen Hashem said the very minimum the world needed to do in Syria was to carve out a militarily protected “safe zone” in north-west Syria, similar to the one made for the Kurds in northern Iraq in 1991.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-18200090?
This video shows the result of a massacre committed in Hawla, Homs. Assad forces stormed the city and slaughtered over 70 civilians, most of them women and children.
http://www.youtube.com/verify_controversy?next_url=/watch%3Fv%3DLy0WBt-wNl8%26feature%3Dplayer_embedded
Doctor tells of 2,000 women being treated in Damascus for rape
Dr. Malaz Alatassi, a founder and board member of the Syrian Sunrise Foundation, a nonprofit humanitarian aid organization based in the U.S., testified at the European Parliament on April 23, 2012, about atrocities in Syria.
Alatassi reports that he has spoken with a female physician in Damascus who says she is treating some of the 2,000 girls and women raped throughout Syria who have come to Damascus seeking support. The youngest was a 7-year-old girl who died on the operating room table, he said. Many women are pregnant and/or have tested HIV-positive, according to Alatassi. There is not enough medical, psychological, or social support to treat the women’s needs, he said, adding that many have lost husbands or parents.
The dates and locations of the reported rapes are unknown. Because Syrian government officials currently refuse to allow access to journalists, researchers, and aid workers, Women Under Siege cannot independently verify this report of sexualized violence in Syria.
https://womenundersiegesyria.crowdmap.com/reports/view/45
