A Syrian rebel who was filmed apparently cutting out and eating the organs of a soldier has defended his actions as revenge for regime atrocities, Time magazine reported on Tuesday.
The gruesome video threw the spotlight on war crimes allegations against the opposition, and put the mainstream rebel leadership and its backers on the defensive.
Washington said it was the act of a lone individual unrepresentative of the armed opposition as a whole, but the UN human rights chief demanded an investigation into a growing number of allegations of “very serious violations by opposition fighters.”
Time said it had talked by Skype with the fighter in the video, who it identified as Khalid al-Hamad.
Al-Hamad claimed he was driven to the gruesome acts by footage on the dead soldier’s mobile phone, showing him “humiliating” a naked woman and her two daughters.
The US news weekly said that al-Hamad described participating in other acts of mutilating regime forces, including militiamen known as shabiha.
“I have another video clip ... In the clip I am sawing another shabiha with a saw. The saw we use to cut trees. I sawed him in small pieces and large ones,” Time quoted him as saying.
The magazine said al-Hamad, a Sunni like much of the opposition fighting against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, expressed hatred of members of the leader’s Alawite sect.
“Hopefully, we will slaughter all of them,” he told the magazine.
“They were the ones who killed our children in Baba Amr and raped our women,” he said, referring to a neighborhood of Homs.
The video, in which al-Hamad leans over a uniformed body, cuts out organs and then holds one up to his mouth, has prompted an outcry around the world.
The opposition National Coalition swiftly condemned al-Hamad’s action, saying it “contradicts the morals of the Syrian people, as well as the values and principles of the Free Syrian Army.”
US Department of State spokesman Patrick Ventrell said Washington had “raised this gruesome act in our recent conversations with leaders of the Supreme Military Council.”
They “assured us that they do not support such actions and that this is not representative of the vast majority of the armed opposition,” he added.
However, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay demanded a probe into the growing number of allegations of torture, summary executions and other abuses by rebel fighters.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported on Tuesday that three captured army officers had been summarily executed in the northern city of Raqa by fighters of the al-Nusra Front.
The group, which has pledged loyalty to al-Qaeda, is not part of the Free Syrian Army, but it is a major fighting force on the ground.
Pillay described what was shown in the video as a “truly atrocious act” and called on rebel commanders to “do everything in their power to halt such gross crimes.
“They must investigate this incident, along with other alleged very serious violations by opposition fighters, including acts of torture, and a succession of apparent summary executions and extra-judicial killings,” she said.
Pillay renewed her calls for the UN Security Council to task the International Criminal Court with investigating allegations of war crimes against rebel as well as government forces.
“I have repeatedly called for the case of Syria to be referred by the Security Council to the International Criminal Court, so that legal proceedings can begin against people believed to be responsible for serious international crimes, including war crimes and crimes against humanity, irrespective of whether they are on the side of the government or are in opposition to it,” she said.
Crowds in Bangladesh are flocking to snap photographs with an unlikely social media star — an albino buffalo with flowing blond hair nicknamed “Donald Trump” that is due to be sacrificed within days. Owner Zia Uddin Mridha, 38, said his brother named the 700kg bull over its flowing helmet of hair resembling the signature look of the US president. “My younger brother picked this name because of the buffalo’s extraordinary hair,” he said at his farm in Narayanganj, just outside the capital, Dhaka. Mridha said that a constant stream of curious visitors — social media fans, onlookers and children — have come throughout
It began as a satirical online project. Now millions of young people in India are flocking to it as an outlet for their frustration. A parody political party called the Cockroach Janta Party, with the insect as its symbol, has exploded across India’s social media by turning absurdist humor into protest. Memes and short videos mocking corruption, joblessness and political dysfunction have flooded social media sites, where millions of users are embracing the cockroach — known for its ability to survive harsh conditions — as a tongue-in-cheek symbol of endurance. The online movement’s rise has been unusually rapid. The Cockroach Janta Party (CJP)
HOTTER: While Indians are accustomed to summer heat, climate change has caused northwestern India to warm faster than other parts of the country, an academic said Roads and markets have emptied during afternoons and some farmers have switched to nighttime work to avoid scorching temperatures as a heat wave grips large parts of India. The India Meteorological Department forecast maximum temperatures for yesterday of about 45°C in the capital, New Delhi, where authorities have opened temporary “cooling zones” to help people cope. The weather department warned that conditions would likely persist across several northern regions in the coming days, with temperatures staying well above seasonal averages. Authorities urged people to stay indoors during the hottest hours and take precautions against heat-related illnesses. India declares a heat wave whenever maximum temperatures
BIGGER ROLE: Beijing has said it maintains an impartial stance on the war in Ukraine, but by training Russian troops, China is far more involved than previously known China’s armed forces secretly trained about 200 Russian military personnel in China late last year, and some have since returned to fight in Ukraine, according to three European intelligence agencies and documents seen by Reuters. While China and Russia have held a number of joint military exercises since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Beijing has repeatedly said that it is neutral in the conflict and presents itself as a peace mediator. The covert training sessions, which predominantly focused on the use of drones, were outlined in a dual-language Russian-Chinese agreement signed by senior Russian and Chinese officers in Beijing on
RSS