SIR - 2018 looks already set to be yet another year disfigured by war atrocities, as the news from Ghouta in Syria sadly makes clear. The aid group, Medicines Sans Frontieres has revealed 13 hospitals that it supports have been destroyed or damaged in recent days, while other international organisations monitoring the Syrian crisis have claimed there is clear evidence that hospitals have been deliberately targeted.
Susannah Sirkin, director of international policy at Physicians for Human Rights, said “The unspeakable suffering we are witnessing was deliberately and meticulously implemented over time. The current situation is the lethal result of a conscious strategy of besiegement, blocking of aid and, ultimately, the illegal destruction of civilian targets with bombs.”
One ambulance driver said, “Even as we’re rescuing people from under the rubble or driving them to the hospitals, we are mercilessly and directly targeted.”
But, despite the sheer awfulness of it all, there has been little ‘diplomatic’ momentum. It seems the world can only watch, perhaps almost desensitised whilst witnessing yet another war crime.
David Hornsby, West View Avenue, Wrose
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