Today is Human Rights Day but there are many countries where such a notion does not exist including Syria where I used to spend my summers as a child; and where I ran culinary tours until the revolution started. So many children like these two beautiful ones have been killed by a monstrous regime that has no respect for human life let alone human rights, while many of those who have escaped death have been brutalised and humiliated simply because they want their dignity and freedom. Sadly, the International community is still nowhere near taking any meaningful action to protect the protesters. As a result, more people are killed, arrested, tortured, raped, being made homeless and this on a daily basis. The videos coming out of Syria are getting more and more gruesome. Today, and every day for that matter, I think of all the people I have met on my trips there, like the gorgeous children and the stern old man in the picture below and I wonder if they are suffering, or indeed if they are still alive. And of course I think of all those who are suffering and I would like to dedicate this post to my fellow Syrians wishing that a new order is established very soon where human and other rights are respected.

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