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In northwestern Syria, civilians continue to die in a war that won't end
Many are still dying in the Syrian government's three-month-long raid on Idlib, the last province still holding out against the regime. Syrian photographer Anas al-Dyab, who was working with AFP, is one of the latest victims.
Every day, several dozen people perish under the bombs. In Syria, Russian and regime air raids on the northwestern province of Idlib, which still eludes the control of president Bashar al-Assad, and on the neighbouring provinces of Aleppo, Hamah, and Lattakia remain intense.
In the past 10 days, air strikes by the Syrian government and its allies on schools, hospitals, markets and bakeries have killed at least 103 civilians, including 26 children, UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet said in a statement on Friday.
“These are civilian objects, and it seems highly unlikely, given the persistent pattern of such attacks, that they are all being hit by accident,” Bachelet said, adding that the rising toll had been met with “apparent international indifference”.
Among the many victims of the conflict is Anas al-Dyab, a 22-year-old photographer and videographer who worked with AFP and whose photos were published by FRANCE 24 along with articles on Syria.
The young man was killed on July 21 in air strikes on the town of Khan Sheikhoun along with 17 other civilians, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH) and the White Helmets, a volunteer search and rescue organization operating in rebel areas. Anas al-Dyab was one of their volunteers.
The funeral of the citizen journalist was held in a mosque before his remains, wrapped in a shroud bearing the White Helmets logo, were buried in a cemetery in Idlib city. The bombings prevented him from being buried in Khan Sheikhoun.
"He was killed while trying to show the world what's happening in Syria."
"This is a great loss for us," Raëd Saleh, the director of the White Helmets, told AFP, accusing Moscow and Damascus of complicity with the rebels and jihadists. “He was killed while trying to show the world what is happening in Syria.”
According to the OSDH, the freelance photographer, who had been wounded several times during the conflict, lost his life while taking refuge in the basement of a three-storey building. He was with two members of the rebel group Jaich al-Ezza, formerly supported by Washington and active in parts of Idlib province and neighbouring Hama province.
"I will only leave Khan Sheikhoun as a martyr," he had once vowed, according to his family. CNN, which interviewed him in March, paid tribute to him by publishing several of the photos he had taken in recent months.
Since western journalists have great difficulty covering the war in Syria, al-Dyab’s job was to document, through photos on his Twitter account, the daily lives of the country’s inhabitants, the white helmet rescue operations in which he was involved and the aftermath of the bombings on Khan Sheikhoun. The town, targeted in April 2017 by a sarin gas attack that the UN attributed to the Syrian regime, was deserted after several thousand inhabitants fled.
"They target innocent civilians and try to kill as many of us as possible," he said from a hospital bed, where he was being treated for leg injuries he sustained during a bombing on September 8, 2018 while filming the damage caused by a previous air raid. While calling for help, he left his camera running to record "evidence to incriminate this criminal
More than 630 civilians killed since the end of April
The Damascus regime and its Russian ally have intensified their bombardments of the Idlib region, which has been dominated by rebels and jihadists, including the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group (the former Syrian branch of Al Qaeda), since late April. Over the last three months, more than 630 civilians have died, according to the OSDH, while more than 400,000 people have been displaced, according to the UN.
"Idlib's nightmare is getting worse. We have witnessed one of the deadliest attacks on civilian areas since the beginning of the military escalation almost three months ago," Mark Cutts, the United Nations’ Deputy Regional Humanitarian Coordinator for the Syria Crisis said on July 22.
The military action continues despite a September 2018 agreement between Russia and Turkey supporting certain rebel groups and aimed at preventing a major offensive in Idlib by forces loyal to Damascus. The agreement provided for a "demilitarized zone" to separate territories held by jihadists and rebels from those held by the government.
