Ahead of the holy Muslim month of Ramadan, a market in Syria’s ravaged Douma is drawing hundreds who can finally afford food, cleaning supplies and toys after years of siege.
Sponsored by the Syrian Ministry of Internal Trade and Consumer Protection, the four-day market opened on Sunday in a vast courtyard in Douma, the main town in the one-time opposition bastion of Eastern Ghouta near Damascus.
Regime forces last month recaptured Ghouta after a ferocious offensive that displaced tens of thousands, both to government-controlled zones around Damascus and to opposition-held parts of northern Syria.
Photo: EPA
Those who stayed are trying to piece their lives together, and many from Douma and the surrounding towns headed to the market on Sunday to buy goods for their damaged homes.
Crowds of men, women and children streamed into the maze of stalls offering detergent, strained yoghurt and instant coffee, among other goods.
Umm Mohammad, a 50-year-old shopper, peered at the price tag on a can of processed meat before putting it back on the shelf.
“My kitchen in Douma was empty, but several days ago I started fixing it up and preparing it to be full of all kinds of things,” she told reporters.
She sported a full-body black robe and face veil and was already carrying bags weighed down with food.
“I’m going to rush home to my children after buying them butter and halvah,” she said, referring to a crumbly, sesame-based sweet.
The goods at the market cost just a fraction of what they did months ago, when a five-year siege made food, medicine and other basic goods either hard to find or too expensive.
As the stocks at storefronts dwindled over the years, Ghouta’s 400,000 residents were left relying on rare deliveries of humanitarian aid or products smuggled in through tunnels.
“I haven’t seen this in years,” said Hassan Saryoul, a 42-year-old resident, holding up a box of paper napkins.
“Napkins were like drugs — virtually banned. A kilo of sugar cost 22,000 Syrian pounds [US$43] but now it is around 500 pounds,” he told reporters.
He was carrying bags in both hands and struggling to maneuver around the masses of shoppers: “If I could carry even more things, I would have.”
Nearly 40 companies are displaying their wares at the “Goodness in Ghouta” market. It is the second such government-backed effort in Ghouta in recent weeks, after a similar market in the nearby town of Kafr Batna.
Syrian Minister of Internal Trade and Consumer Protection Abdullah al-Gharabi told reporters that a total of six such markets would be organized throughout Ramadan, the Muslim holy month of fasting that began yesterday.
Ghouta fell to rebels in 2012 and was placed under a crippling siege the following year. With help from its ally Russia, the Syrian government recaptured Ghouta one month ago through a blend of military pressure and population transfer deals.
Raed Zabadina pulled bottles of laundry detergent, bleach and shampoo from the shelves behind him and packed them into bags for impatient customers.
“It’s natural there would be so many customers in the cleaning section. A big box of detergent costs 500 Syrian pounds here, while a small box in the past would cost 3,000 pounds,” he told reporters. “This amount was just impossible for people to pay.”
Mohammad al-Hafi, 31, was also barely able to catch his breath behind a booth selling City Cafe, the ubiquitous brand of Syrian instant coffee.
“I had to shut the door because of the crowds. People here are buying much more because of how desperately they need food and other goods,” Hafi said as he jotted down sales numbers.
Just outside the market, Douma remains devastated, with mangled cars rusting outside crumbling buildings and rubble still littering the dusty streets.
Syrian flags, portraits of a beaming Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, and brightly colored posters advertising the pop-up market were plastered all over the gutted concrete residences.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including