BEIRUT: An unprecedented aerial bombardment of Aleppo by the Syrian government has sent thousands of people fleeing in recent weeks and exacerbated an already dire humanitarian situation in the city.
Some of the most intense bombing came during the Geneva II peace talks between the Assad regime and the opposition-in-exile which began in late January, with 800 people dying in the first week of the discussions alone. Doctors in the northern city have reported high civilian casualties, with women and children bearing the brunt of the bombardment.
A doctor working in Aleppo, who asked not to be named for security reasons, said the majority of wounds he sees are among women and children, and the elderly.
“So many amputations, head injuries and abdomen injuries,” he said. “It is random shelling: They’re not attacking the fronts, they are attacking the city, where there are no fighters.”
The doctor, who spoke to The Daily Star via Skype, is not an Aleppo native – he moved to the city over a year ago from next-door Idlib province when a call for extra doctors was put out.
“I realized that they needed me: There is a huge number of injured civilians here, because of the barrel bombs,” he said.
While the casualty figures are staggering, the number of doctors who remain in the city presents an equally grim statistic. There are only 65 in total now, he said, where once there were 3,700.
The full article continues at http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2014/Feb-21/248001-aleppo-doctor-speaks-of-horror-of-barrel-bombs.ashx on the Daily Star’s website.