Another really great set of pictures collected by The Denver Post for their pblog series.
I was very pleased to see my friend and photographer John Wreford recently returned from Damascus. He lives there, has for a number of years, knows the country well, so his understanding of what was happening offered another perspective. The warm, friendly, generous Syrian people are suffering, dying and the world stands by and does nothing.
“(AP) Fighting between forces loyal to President Bashar Assad and members of the Free Syrian Army continue in Syria. The U.N. estimates that Syria’s crackdown has killed more than 7,500 people so far. The killings add to the pressure on U.N. Security Council members who are meeting to decide what to do next to stop the violence. The international community’s current effort—a peacemaking mission by Annan—is faltering, with both the Syrian government and the opposition refusing to talk to one another.”
Syria launched a long-anticipated assault to crush the opposition in the rebellious north, bombarding its main city with tank shells from all sides and clashing with rebel fighters struggling to hold back an invasion.
President Bashar Assad rejected any immediate negotiations with the opposition, striking a further blow to already staggering international efforts for talks to end the conflict. Assad told U.N. envoy Kofi Annan that a political solution is impossible as long as “terrorist groups” threaten the country.
Ahmed, center, mourns his father Abdulaziz Abu Ahmed Khrer, who was killed by a Syrian Army sniper, during his funeral in Idlib, north Syria, Thursday, March 8, 2012. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd) #
Members of the Free Syrian Army in Idlib Prvoince, Syria, February, 2012. The Free Syrian ArmyÅs strength lies inside the towns. The regular Syrian Army, which has proved to be unreliable and is already stretched thin, is reluctant to storm the towns and consolidate control. (Tyler Hicks/The New York Times) #
Armed only with rifles and homemade bombs, members of the Free Syrian Army attack a column of Syrian Army Tanks in Saraqib, in Idlib Province, Syria, Feb. 15, 2012. (Tyler Hicks/The New York Times) #
A fighter with the Free Syrian Army, the armed opposition group made up largely of defectors from the Syrian military, attacks a column of Syrian Army Tanks in Saraqib, in Idlib Province, Syria, Feb. 15, 2012. The armed opposition in Syria is led by the underequipped Free Syrian Army. (Tyler Hicks/The New York Times) #
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Oxford School of Photography 