Aleppo/Syria solidarity protest - Cardiff, Wales

Demonstrators gather at Cardiff Castle in Wales to raise awareness and show their solidarity with the people of Aleppo in the war torn country of Syria.

Paul Conroy and the Peoples Convoy to Syria

   The People’s Convoy: A Children’s Hospital for Aleppo

British photographer Paul Conroy in Syria (Image reproduced courtesy of Paul Conroy)

On 22 February 2012 during the Syrian uprising, Paul Conroy was on assignment for the The Sunday Times with journalist Marie Colvin, the British photographer was injured while covering events from the Syrian city of Homs, a stronghold of Syrian opposition forces. The building where he and other journalists were based was shelled by Syrian government forces. Marie Colvin and French photojournalist Remi Ochlik were killed in the attack,  Conroy was injured along with another journalist, French reporter Edith Bouvier of Le Figaro. Conroy suffered leg injuries in the attack and was subsequently smuggled out of the city and across the Syrian border to Lebanon. He wrote a book about his experience called "Under the Wire - Marie Colvin's Final Assignment". Since then he has been recouperating in the relative quiet of Devon.

Paul's book about his experiences in Syria

Now he feels it is "Time to turn words into actions", one of his very good friends is Dr Rola Alkurdi Hallam, "cousin to one of my rescuers and the doctor famous for treating the victims of the infamous barrel bomb attack where hundreds of children were filmed, their flesh hanging from the bone in a scene from what could well have been a zombie apocalypse."

Paul and Rola are planning and raising funds for a "Peoples Convoy" to Syria to deliver seriously needed medical equipment. 
 
The last children’s hospital in besieged Aleppo was destroyed by airstrikes just last month. But people are coming together to take action. On the 17th December, a group of doctors will drive a convoy from London to the Syrian border with enough supplies for a new children’s hospital. From there, local aid organisations will get it to doctors in Syria so they can start work. They’re asking for our help to fund this mission and support the incredible job that medics do every day in Syria.

  In the video above Rola Alkurdi Hallam talks to Channel 4 news about the Peoples Convoy.

Paul remembers; "Five years ago laying in the shattered remains of what had, only minutes earlier, been the Baba Amr media centre in Homs, Syria. Next to me lay the shredded corpses of my friend and Sunday Times colleague Marie Colvin and the young French photographer, Remi Ochlic. We had been reporting from the besieged town, and at that time the estimated death toll was 8000, that figure now stands at nearly half a million. I am alive today because of the bravery of dozens of young, desperate and very brave civilians. Most of them died rescuing me. 
For five years now I have had to listen to the shallow, half hearted words of politicians (the few exceptions know who they are), who, for whatever reasons, have failed to halt the murderous onslaught of the Assad regime against its own people.

After the last of the hospitals was decimated by the Russians, Rola and I decided, in the words of my old friend Tony Benn that, 'If you want something doing, do it yourself.' That's what we are doing.
We cannot rely on the broken promises or vacuous statement of intent by politicians, many busy packing to move on to greener, and often more lucrative pastures."

Paul and Rola have made this appeal: 

"We are organising the People's Convoy for Aleppo. Essentially a flat pack emergency hospital to treat the children of Aleppo, who now have no emergency hospitals at all. We are free of any government or official funding and are relying on the inherent sense of humanity most of us carry within. We need volunteers, media attention, celebs to raise awareness and people to travel either the full length of the convoy, one stage, or even one day to give us a good send off. We owe the maimed, starving, traumatised victims of the Assad/Putin onslaught so much, this seems the least we can do. So help us please, if need be Rola and I will deliver it ourselves, I suspect though there are enough decent, moral minded people out there for that not to happen.
Please check out the links on how to help. Join us in the people's convoy. In twenty years time you can look your kids in the eyes and say, ' I tried', that's all we are asking. 

Thank you all,
Paul and Rola x"

The Peoples Convoy intend to raise the approx £90,000 needed for the Children’s Hospital through crowd-funding. They need to raise a further £20,000 towards the costs of the convoy. 

The convoy will leave on the 17th December and start in the UK and travel overland through France, Belgium, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Turkey. The convoy will take 5 days to reach the Turkey-Syria border. When the convoy reaches the Turkey-Syria border it will be dis-assembled and handed over to IDA. They will then transfer the hospital resources through known routes and channels to mitigate the risk of remaining in convoy. Convoy chaperones will return home from Turkey.

The logistics of the operation will be handled by Across the Divide. They have 20 years experience of working around the globe, from remote projects in Mozambique to the BBC’s recent Children in Need Rickshaw Challenge.

If you want to volunteer, donate or get ivolved you can contact Cando, the organisation behind the Peoples Convoy by emailing: rola@candoaction.org

Or check out the links below to find out more about the Peoples Convoy and Cando:

https://youtu.be/BVWUsUlkefE https://act.thesyriacampaign.org/donate/peoples-convoy/
http://www.candoaction.org

Pictures by Muhammed

When I first met Muhammed he was rather taken with my camera equipment, I couldn't resist and let him use one of Nikon DSLR's.

These are his pictures...

Fundraising for Muhammed and Muhammed's Hope.

As you may be aware, last year I travelled to Turkey and met members of the Syrian community. Their plight, and Muhammed's story is what has inspired me to start fundraising to do what I can to help.

Muhammed is one of the Syrians I met last year, he is 8 years old and is a double amputee after loosing his legs in a rocket attack in 2012. You can find out more on my blog muhammedshope.com

To get the ball rolling I have set up a crowdfunding page to start to raise the funds required to help Muhammed access medical care and a new pair of prosthetic legs. You can check it out by clicking here

 

Video; Muhammed's Story.

This is the short docu piece I shot whilst in Turkey last year in which Syrian fixer/translator and young Muhammed talk about Muhammed's situation.

Find out more about Muhammed and the charity I am setting up in his name here.

Mental Health Awareness Week; Why

In response to people who have been questioning my motives for what I have been up to recently...

For so long I had felt like I was at the bottom of a pit with no way out. Losing my wife of 9 years felt like the end of everything. Up to that point I had never seen a dead person let alone watch someone die in your arms.  It has taken four years to drag myself out of the pit I was in, constantly being dragged back by the PTSD I was suffering from, along with half a dozen other psychological issues I had been diagnosed with by my therapist on the way. 

“I got away for a little while, but then it came back much harder. “

- Damon Albarn

That’s how things were for those first few years after, up and down and all around. Bouncing off the walls feeling like a prisoner. I can sort of laugh about how ill I was then, but then it’s rather shocking as you don’t realise how bad you were until much longer after the fact. Then you realise how far you have come. You never get over it, you just learn to deal with it appropriately, and after all being upset about certain things is just part of being human. It’s what makes you normal. 

I say to people I’m better now. Guess that depends on your definition of better. 

For me being better comes from having a greater sense of perspective I think. Being mentally ill I think is when you lose all perspective. For me it is anyway. What is it they say? “Too close and you lose sight of the bigger picture.” 

For me perspective has come in the form of the plight of Syrians fleeing the civil war. Last year I had the privilege of meeting a family from Syria in Istanbul. Their story touched me deeply. Click on the link to read Muhammed’s Story. Obviously one is aware that their story is in no way unique after five years of war have ravaged the country, but I can honestly say I have never been moved so much by meeting people before in the course of my life. Here is a father with his child, just like me and my children they have lost their wife and mother, but they also lost other family members, Muhammed lost his legs and they have become refugees in a different country.  I couldn’t begin to comprehend the trauma they went through, I was staggered, I know how hard the loss of my wife was for me and my family. I could recognise the signs of PTSD in Muhammed and others I met. Yet here they were, welcoming me into their home and bending over backwards to keep me and my friend topped up with tea, coffee, food and cigarettes, imploring us to come back when we felt like we were over extending them.    

I cried for them in Istanbul airport whilst composing captions for the pictures I had taken, waiting to board my plane back to the UK, knowing I had sat in their apartment and promised to do anything in my power to help them. 

This is why I am setting up Muhammed’s Hope, in a way the idea I guess is that by doing this I am paying forward the kindness that was extended to me during my recovery process. People like Marvi Lacar through 1in20, and Daniella Zalcman through Echo/Sight have been instrumental in shining a guiding light on the path to recovery.  Leonie & Greg Marinovich  and Yasmin Al Tellawy for their help and advice in the initial planning stages of Muhammed’s Hope. 

Initially the focus is on helping Muhammed, but if we can raise enough money through fundraising then we have the scope to help others like him, of which there are unfortunately many. 

You know, for me if we are successful in helping Muhammed then the all of the pain and anguish that I have been through will have all been worth it, because I wouldn’t be here today doing what I am doing for him  if it wasn’t for all the things that had gone before. It’s all for a purpose. When I was growing up I used to read a lot of existentialism, that’s all about carving your own path in life, it is up to you which path you choose. What positives you can bring from the negatives. It’s a beautiful world out there and you won’t get to see it if you don’t take yourself out there. 

Shortly I will be following Yasmin Al Tellawy’s awe inspiring example and setting myself some physical fundraising challenges to raise money to help Muhammed and his family, no matter how hard they are they won’t come close to what that little boy has been through. 

 www.muhammedshope.com

Muhammed's Story.

Last year I met Muhammed, he is 8 years old and a double amputee. He and his family allowed me to speak to him about what happened to him on 2nd May 2012, the day he lost his legs. I filmed him as he talked to me...

"My uncle came to visit us to collect some things and take us to see my grandparent's.

On the way to Grandfather's we stopped at my Dad's barber shop to give him the house key and his phone charger. When we got there my Mum changed my Grandfather's clothes and made Moshi and Mtawama for lunch, then my Uncle started to give my Grand Uncle a shave.

My brother was sat in my Grand Mother's lap and Mum told him to go check on granddad, when he came back the rocket exploded. My Uncle was like a piece of burnt wood, my Grand Uncle was on his back, my little brother was in pieces and burnt. I looked at my legs and they were in pieces and they were awful, my Mother was bent over.

My Grandfather's friends came and carried me down stairs into a car, they sent me to Zarzor hospital. In Hospital they gave me an injection and tried to clean my body, then they sent me to an ambulance and I saw my cousin Drmia, her nose and face were cut very bad, I said "Where are we?"

"I don't know, I don't know!" she said.

Then they sent me to Saqhor hospital to an operating room, they put a mask over my nose, I was breathing and then I don't know what happened!

At the hospital they gave me some chocolate, I said I wanted to give it to my little brother, they said he was dead.

After that I stayed at the hospital, the doctor who operated on me and the staff were very nice to me. Thank Allah for them. After my operation I stayed in hospital, I played with a lot children and people would visit me and make me happy. One time they got me a mask and another time they got me a water pistol.

When I grow up I want to be a Doctor or an Engineer.

In Syria they should help the children and the men, all of them, because Syria is destroyed, there is nothing to call Syria, just war, war, war, bomb, rocket and barrel bomb.”  

UPDATE: When I first met Muhammed he was part of a programme being run by a newly started charity MedChild International, unfortunately this charity is no longer functioning. At present I am working with Muhammed's family to see if  we can find another charity to help him, we are waiting for a response to appeals I have sent out. 

Because Muhammed is a growing boy his leg bones continue to grow and they are in danger of growing out of his stumps, he needs an operation to correct this and is likely to need more operations as he continues to grow. If we are unsuccesful in securing a charity to help with Muhammed's medical care I will start a fundraising campaign so we can get the operation done in Turkey where he is currently living.   

Muhammed's Hope. The heart wrenching story of one Syrian boy.

Muhammed Qamand is 8,  he is from the Ansari Sharqy area of Aleppo in Syria. On May 2nd 2013 Muhammed and his family were visiting grandparents in the area of Bab Al Hadid when Assad's air force attacked the rebel held area. The blast resulted in the death of his Grandparents, Uncle, his Mother and his brother. Muhammed's legs were blown off and his cousin received facial injuries. He was just 5 years old. Muhammed and his father eventually made it over the Turkish border through rebel held areas. He now lives in Istanbul with his father. Muhammed is currently waiting for surgery to his legs to remove all of the shrapnel and to prepare them for new prosthetic legs. Muhammed will require many follow-up medical procedures as he grows and the leg bones continues to grow. 
 He is under a care program with MedChild International, an NGO based out of the United States run by Scottish born Jan Maren Innes. MedChild help children from war zones and disaster zones, also children with congenital health issues. MedChild will soon hold an online photo auction to raise funds, they will also donate some of the money raised to the James Foley Legacy Foundation, Jan was a friend of Foley's and had been talking with him about holding a photo auction to raise money to help children before he was killed in Syria last year, they will also donate to Sebastian Junger's RISC (Reporters Instructed in Saving Colleagues) Training. With a planned launch of 2016 for MedChild Jan decided to move things forward as she had been presented with cases which she knew she could help now, so brought the timetable forward to this year. MedChild are unique in that they will provide Muhammed's care until he turns 18, as they do with all cases.  

Odds for photojournalists get shorter...

   These are harrowing times that we live in, with war on nearly every continent, and it seems to be getting worse. Throughout my time as a freelance photographer girlfriends and my late wife have always said very early on in the relationship, "no motorbikes, no warzones!! Or else!"
   Following the recent release of  the Reporters Without Borders annual report into the number of journalists displaced, kidnapped or murdered it would seem my overprotective partners had the right idea. Check out the facts;

2012 in numbers
88 journalists killed (+33%)
879 journalists arrested 1993 journalists threatened or physically attacked
38 journalists kidnapped
73 journalists fled their country
6 media assistants killed
47 netizens and citizen-journalists killed
144 bloggers and netizens arrested

Perhaps most worrying is the fact that there has been an 840% increase in the amount of netizens and citizen-journalists killed in the past 12 months. A 33% increase in the amount of journalists killed and a 46% increase in the amount of journalists kidnapped. To get some perspective remember 63 journalists were killed in the 8 year period(1965-1973) of the American involvement in Vietnam.

The Top 5 most dangerous places for journalists in 2012 were;

1.Syria
2.Somalia
3.Pakistan
4.Mexico
5.Brazil

This has been the worst year for journalist casualties since Reporters Without Borders began compiling these reports back in 1995.

You can check out the full report by following this link to download the report as a PDF;  http://fr.rsf.org/IMG/pdf/bilanannuelgb.pdf

Just think...11 years ago on the 23rd of January 2002, US journalist Daniel Pearl was kidnapped by a Pakistani militant group while on his way to an interview with Sheikh Mubarak Ali Gilani in Karachi, Pakistan. Emails were sent to the United States with a number of demands in exchange for Pearl's release. Despite the United States' efforts, nine days later Pearl was beheaded.

As I write this photojournalist James Foley has been missing for 63 days in Syria. Check out the Free James Foley site here; www.freejamesfoley.org

 American journalist Austin Tice has also been missing since Aug. 13 2012. A video surfaced on Oct. 1 2012 showing Tice in the custody of foreign Islamic fighters.(Austin Tice...Kidnappers Video??) But the video's authenticity has been questioned. The US State Department has asked the Syrian government to be “more forthcoming” with information about the missing journalist. But the Syrian government says it has no information about Tice's whereabouts.

 On August 20 2012, (156 days ago!!!)  Palestinian-Jordanian Bashar Fahmi Al-Kadumi, with the Arabic-language television channelAl-Hurra, also disappeared in the northern province of Aleppo with his colleague, Cuneyt Unal, who has since been released.