FRANCE: One year on after the start of protests in Syria, 2,000 gather in Paris in support of Syrian people

Record ID: 280441

  • Title: FRANCE: One year on after the start of protests in Syria, 2,000 gather in Paris in support of Syrian people
  • Date: 16th March 2012
  • Summary: PARIS, FRANCE (MARCH 15, 2012) (REUTERS) HOTEL DE VILLE WITH GATHERING CROWD BANNER READING PARIS SUPPORTS THE SYRIAN PEOPLE GATHERING CROWD AND BANNER BANNER CALLING FOR FALL OF SYRIAN REGIME FLAGS AND CROWD PARIS MAYOR BETRAND DELANOE AND MEMBERS OF THE SYRIAN COUNCIL ON THE STAGE YOUNG DEMONSTRATOR VARIOUS OF CROWD VARIOUS OF CROWD WITH CANDLES JOURNALISTS INT
  • Embargoed: 31st March 2012 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: France, France
  • Country: France
  • Topics: Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVAQIC3CZUBOZ3X8P8KJ6W8ROL1
  • Story Text: Approximately 2,000 demonstrators gathered in Paris on Thursday (March 15) in a show of support for the ongoing protests in Syria against the regime of the president Bashar al-Assad, one year after the first demonstrations in the country.
    Paris Mayor Betrand Delanoe addressed the crowd, saying the French capital had turned out to show that the city and its citizens were with the Syrian people in their struggle.
    The President of the exiled Syrian National Council (SNC), Burhan Ghalioun spoke, thanking the crowd for their support. He spoke of the obligations of the international community to act to end the violence.
    "The international community has obligations to help a people who are currently being killed trying to resist, to confront, to free themselves from this dictatorship," he said.
    Exactly a year ago, a few dozen activists took to the streets of Damascus to protest, calling for more freedom. This week, troops loyal to Assad have pummeled rebel strongholds across Syria, deploying tanks and heavy artillery to crush opponents in a string of cities and villages, including Deraa in the far south where the rebellion took hold last March.
    The United Nations estimates that more than 8,000 people, mostly civilians, have died in the fighting, while some 230,000 Syrians have been displaced from their homes, including 30,000 who have fled abroad, raising the prospect of a refugee crisis.
    Over the past 12 months the unrest has morphed from a largely peaceful pro-democracy movement into a full-scale rebellion, led by a disparate collection of lightly armed militants and army deserters grouped in the Free Syrian Army.
    They have briefly succeeded in wresting control of various towns and villages from the authorities but invariably ceded their gains in the face of a much stronger government force.
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