 OK, so welcome everybody to the White Game tonight. And we've got everybody from the house and this is the new fireside chat format that we've put together for this evening. And we're very happy to welcome Ronan Tying here. And Ronan is a member of the IEA here and is a contributor to a lot of our discussions and debates here at the Institute. So he's a good friend of the Institute. We're delighted. And we heard the release of this critically film series, The Impossible Revolution came out. We're really keen to get involved in a minute talk. And as I was talking to Ronan, hopefully the discussion won't be so much about filming the techniques, but we're really hoping to get a kind of discussion about the types of things Ronan has picked up since from making the film about the conflicts itself. And obviously it's an incredibly complex issue that I'm sure everybody here has some understanding of. But every new perspective that you get gives you a new way of looking at it. So we're really looking forward to hearing about it today. And Ronan's film company Esperanza and a little bit of a run for a while. This is one of the significant movies that's been released for a while. So it's really a good time to have it, so. And I'll turn it over to you. Thank you. And if you want to show it first, or if you want to talk a little bit. Maybe I'll just talk a bit first. Yeah, I just should. At first of all I want to thank you all for coming. I really do appreciate it because I avail of every opportunity to talk about Syria for not just, of course you might say he wouldn't say that, only trying to sell the film and all that. Which of course is true. But actually, unfortunately the democratic revolution in Syria has lost the narrative war. And I'll be honest, as someone who sees himself, but I do believe everybody should be a human rights defender. And I consider myself to be an aspiring human rights defender and have been throughout our film making careers every single film we've made. Even not intentionally, it seems to have been on those kind of themes and issues, not about rights and people risking their lives for other people's rights and so forth. I felt compelled to make this film. With the credit for making it though, we really should probably go more than 50% to our lady who was extremely tenacious in pursuing a special research site because it was, it turned into an environment of a project. Because of the search for archive and so forth. But I don't want to get off on the central point, which is this narrative war, which is sad, primarily because of the Russians to a great extent in their particular expertise in the electronic, on the electronic frontier, have managed to convince far too many people that this is, believe it or not, something that we still believe, we still are a sad fighting ISIS. And I remember in Jane's Defense, we'd be in London discovering that in 2014, only 4%, 4% of the sad military assaults were actually directed against ISIS. The only people fighting ISIS at that stage, in fact, the first people to really take on ISIS in Syria will of course, the Democratic Revolutionary Forces. So just to get back a little to where all this started for me, because I do think you might find it interesting, my first engagement with Syria occurred in Ireland in 2012 where my house of Syrian friends make a presentation to the Dawn Farm Affairs Committee. At that time, only in the verticals of 20,000 Syrians had been killed. At this stage, as you're probably well aware, more than 500,000 people have died in Syria. Half the population, as you're also probably aware, have been forced to flee their homes. Over 6 million are internally displaced, are internally displaced, and about, there's more than five million Syrians refugees in other countries. In other words, it is an absolutely human catastrophe of mega proportions. But even more seriously, Syria has not only become a major humanitarian crisis, it has also completely destabilized the Middle East. It has amplified an existing dynamic, if you like, the famous Shia Sunni civil war, which is called, which of course, is very important, it's an indigenous initiation. It really reflects Saudi-Iranian competition in the Middle East, and Syria represents a huge Iranian victory, with the Iranians making up 80% of Assad's forces. Shumansballah, which obviously heavily subsidized, various Shia militia, which it brought in from Afghanistan, Iran itself, Iraq, and elsewhere. And of course, its own Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and of course, the notorious Quds Force, which is really its foreign military, adventurous element, if you like. And indeed, Syria, Iran's influence in Syria has been very fundamental from the very beginning, because there were Iranian military advisors in Syria from the get-go. And even today, when the Syrian military force, the indigenous force, sold and pleaded, you are more likely to find Iranian officers giving orders to Syrian constructs. So it's a kind of the relationship between Iran and I don't want to sound like a trooper here now, so that came this hard right time to the United States. I defy anyone. These are actual research points that we have come across. So that's the background to it. A very close relationship between Iran and Syria to begin with, in 2011, there was a democratic uprising. In 2011, the Arab Spring, as you all know there, was in flames across the region. But nobody knew Syria, and all the Syrian experts we consulted were unanimous, given this memo of research project, but this documentary, more like a pediatric piece, concluded they were very surprised that people talked to the streets in Syria in 2011. Why? Because the country was very much known as a kingdom of silence. The Assad regime, Assad's father obviously built this up very effectively. A police state, with a huge reputation for effectiveness, very cleverly structured, with competing intelligence services as well, to maximize its effectiveness and almost insulate the regime from any kind of internal coup. So people knew very clearly from what had happened previously during the Muslim Brotherhood uprising in the early 1980s that if you took to the streets in Syria, you would die, if you didn't die, you would be arrested, you would be tortured, you could spend a very long time in prison. And again, I would challenge anyone to, to, you know, to rebut that. It was quite, really very difficult to make this but meeting people who experienced that, you know, going to the street day after day, being shot at, seeing their friends shot, their family shot. And what happened in response to that violence, I mean, the revolution in Syria really is a response to that level of violence. And that was what I find fascinating. That really it was a response to the violence. Because the initial chance that the people were about, you know, freedom, you know, they really wanted to have one country, they wasn't even talking regime change. Within two weeks, however, a people go down the street, it has completely switched away and people were firmly in favor of regime change at that point as it began to evolve and it deepened. It's something I think, why I'm so keen to get people to watch this film at this stage is because if you do not know the modern history of Syria, you're basically a prisoner of the last news story. You see something about terrorism in the newspaper and they say, oh, that's just these crazy terrorists in Syria and they're fighting this government which may be a bad government but better to definitely know than you definitely don't know. When in reality, of course, the Assad regime is almost like a huge complex for manufacturing juries in the sense of creating dissatisfaction but the point that I really want to get across if I've succeeded on the scene is to really share with you my reaction now which is really, I actually see Syria very much as a country with three sides of this conflict on the ground level, apart from the overlay of international forces who have literally contributed to destroying the country. On the one hand, you have a very effective civilian killing machine in the fall of the Assad regime which is really now almost a skeleton of its former self. The bulk of it is made up, substantially by Iranian forces, a coalition if you like, of Iranian forces that are with Russia providing the air force. Assad's army, so-called, is really fractured into a series of matthias and local militias and indeed it's almost a mere rivage but much stronger than the opposition military operations which again are quite chaotic, fragmented and relatively, you know, they're relatively poorly armed but in the middle, if you like, you have civilians. Many of those civilians, especially in opposition areas, are firm believers in what those who took to the streets at the year 2011, they never wanted to take up violence of any description because they knew, as we were told many times, that if this turned violent they would lose and sure enough that's what actually happened because the Assad regime being such, you know, a military dictatorship essentially would also, with the ability to maneuver foreign forces, you know, to literally do anything because in a sense, the Assad regime that was a dead-back to the public Could Assad dictate to the Iranians to go home? Would Assad dictate to the Iranians to go home? Because obviously, his survival now is intrinsically linked with that occupation and similarly with the Russians it's almost amusing as well at the moment when you see the Russians claiming a victory in Syria but they're real winners, as we know from my experience in all wars are those who win on the ground. You know they say you can go so far with bombing but if you don't bring people in on the ground you can't sustain your victory in that context but I don't want to go off the central point to get back to the barriers and the people who have suffered so much for the crime of seeking democracy freedom and dignity that we take for granted it really was and is heart-breaking it is so, so depressing and so unmoved the first document was in Rwanda immediately after the genocide the blood verses still on the ground to think that such mass law could occur again but I know it's happened many times before but without any real outrage here you know there has not been any outrage for Syria I mean there's a remarkable group in Ireland called the Arab-Syrian Solidarity Movement and I say remarkable in the international context because they really make an amazing impact and there's just always citizens who become very upset about what was going on but the pain of those Syrians suffered as they were being killed they actually thought that when we saw them being gone down the street we would call and you see this in the document they assumed we would do something about it but we didn't do anything about it Russia and China and the Security Council they thought any action but what did the United States and the European Union do? absolutely nothing even worse Obama called for a sad to go however on the ground it was obvious to ambassadors that was not a clever thing to do because clearly if you're not going to act if you're in the Middle East when an American president tells a leader to go they assume he's going to go and it sets off a chain reaction so that perhaps and again I'm talking generally now and I do hope you watch the document just for convenience and just for illicit purposes naturally enough if people thought the Americans were going to do something they might take risks they wouldn't ordinarily do would they take up arms? Obama said that to nurture a process they thought they would be rescued and so forth perhaps and that set off a chain reaction that continued throughout as we saw people slowly maturely being forced in many instances to take up arms because the regime really as was tradition in Syria took no quirk you were with them or against them and what a chance when the peaceful revolution started what the Assad regime tugs would scream it's a sad or we burned the country down and in fairness that's exactly what they did we would destroy the country and that would become very apparent when you see the documentary as well but you know it really was as far as they were concerned all it said zero, some came I should also point out this is also the first time I've spoken about Syria where I didn't have the advantage of showing this the film first it's remarkable the emotive lifts up your shoulders when you see the film don't you just sit back and answer questions it's much more relaxing but I do want to really get this across to you if I can that we're talking about real people like you and I the Syrians I found are moderates in a very profound way you know sure like many people in the Middle East many of them obviously are both those but I do think it's also important to bear in mind again to counteract the sad success in the narrative more that when the peaceful uprising started in 2011 the people who came out on the streets were not just Muslims they were not just Sunni Muslims in large numbers there were Christians there were Druze everyone was represented and people we interviewed in the film they were shot down in some way but many were also apprehended and disappeared into sad prisons and it is estimated that Covey as many as 200,000 is still believe or not locked up and you're aware of the torture of eternal treason which is after many of them and I want to talk about Yassine at house in particular in that regard but it is very important to bear in mind the price they have paid for that sacrifice and as I say what really frustrates me is that their struggle which has been incredible and what is suffering there actually and are still injured people just don't know about it because the regime and the Russians have won that narrow war there is a complete lack of appreciation about the nature of the civil society that developed through the revolution and when I mentioned three sides of the conflict I found that in a level particularly in a level right across opposition areas that as the bombs were falling they still had their democratic houses elected they still had civic societies now just that which of course is much easier to show you in the documentary which I hope you will all see eventually the reason if you like the democratic nationalists if you like were defeated was Obama kind of going to go off the message here and comment about the Iran deal which I was extremely enthusiastic about would have become extremely disillusioned because of course Obama personally sent the Iran deal ahead of Syria which was a strategic mistake because of my firm conviction now that the Iran deal was doomed anyway because of the disintegration of Syria because Syria has destabilized the region and I would argue it has potentially destabilized the balance of power in the world it is a world of global significance and that's something I think we we have to we have to be very conscious about and the genesis of Obama if you like leaving you know he leads the Syrian democratic forces up the garden path and then in 2013 at the famous gas attack recording in Ghouta Obama he creates a face-saving device to avoid having to take any action but of course it is disingenuous to say that it is just his thought in the UK Parliament as well and of course in the UK Parliament they voted not to intervene nothing would have been really intervening very much because the principle way is being slaughtered even by the regime at that stage because they were using barrel bombs which we also explore in the documentary we see very clearly how these very crude weapons were very powerful weapons of terror in other words it would have been very easy to kind of compel the regime in my view to have some kind of negotiations at that stage if effective action had been taken to knock up even to knock up their their air power or as a minimum to create humanitarian zones and no-fly zones and so forth at that stage but of course at this stage now that's all sort of people would say that the effective action might say that but those of us who lived through that who monitored that throughout that period saw opportunities missed constantly to create a peaceful settlement those of us who didn't want to see any kind to minimize to bring war to an end you saw so many a string of missed opportunities but Obama's role in that was fascinating because he kind of completely you know left those forces at large but again in fairness to him you know the American people didn't have enthusiasm for the war but then people on the ground never wanted boots on the ground in Syria ever all they wanted was something like those who did take a part was the right to defend themselves in that context given that we wouldn't take effective action which I would personally in favor of heavily sanctioning the Iranians who were already being sanctioned were not sufficient to bring them to an end and also the Russians who had even invested before they directly and militarily intervened in 2015 I do think though I really you know one of the reasons we actually made this film and I even know as I try to summarize this that it can sound complex but really it's not complex at all really it boils down to a sin people just played the trailer now and it's just going to make a few comments afterwards because what it really boils down to is people who had suffered terribly under dictatorship for well over 14 years took to the streets and break cast themselves and were going down and they thought the war would come to their rescue because they peacefully took that great risk and no one came and all that happened was the regime was strengthened by the Iranians who were constantly there and they saved the regime indeed even demonstrations and thankfully a lot of us prefering the nation through our demonstrations in Iran today and they're getting much more probably much more public and more obvious because the Iranians have spent billions on the right of the Assad regime they have lent the regime billions I personally believe and you can easily make a case for that the Iranian people have suffered far more to the regime's support for the Assad regime than the actual sanctions regime and that happens throughout that period now Al-Baba, mind you, he gets the intel he was getting the intel reports every morning he knew this, that's why I personally think he bears a huge responsibility for what's happened in Syria whereas Putin in 2015 became directly involved in slaughtering Syria just not to go ahead too fast I mean the Iranians were there from the beginning they already had militia by the time they left but they started bringing in those militias and those forces the turning point are the dramatic increase in Iranian involvement according to 2013 when ISIS appeared for the first time and Hezbollah underwritten by Iran were brought onto the battlefield now bear in mind though the Iranians were still very strongly there but they always preferred to keep their profile or tried to keep their profile low it became difficult but ISIS made it easier because when the thousands of racists were killed in Syria but as they came home after ISIS they were saying they were fighting terrorism believing that they were directly involved in terrorism including to the militia yard where the military used them to battle the narrative of the war on terror to justify its own very action that Syria could easily fight with terrorism it would be funny where it went so tragic so from 2013 on they very significantly increased their involvement in the country no, as I said I think just at this point it will be useful just to a quick look at the documentary I just want to I don't want to miss that point about the Syrian people because sometimes these discussions turn into geopolitical discussions talking about militaries and all this kind of stuff people and how exactly they are suffering in that context and I really think it's a big handle on that to happen even if I criticize myself the highest aim of the Assad dynasty is to say in power for everything I met repeatedly Assad's father Assad's son and I've never met such cold-blooded murderers naively we thought that as soon as people know what is happening they're all going to support us because who doesn't support people going to the street asking for freedom and not to be tortured and to be treated with dignity people talk about it now as if the choices between some kind of jihadist and Assad and they think that Assad must be the better option because he shaves and he wears a tie and he has a nice pretty wife whereas the other guy has a beard and a blood dripping knife the alternative is not Assad or the terrorists it's a sad versus the people it's a sad versus democracy al-Assad can never win because al-Assad cannot beat that soul, the revolutionary soul inside everyone who went on the streets American artist Bark Nelson was extremely valuable to us as well because although we went through thousands of hours of our kind of footage some of the stuff is just so horrific we couldn't show it and obviously it did allow us to deal with issues which is just fantastic we'll make a film the guy in the sweater I just want to talk to you about briefly, he's called, he's Yassin and out of the house selling and one of the reasons this documentary became such a vital project was we only saw people like that who hadn't been initially published and we had to feature I think to describe him in Syrian terms he's probably a cross between Chowsky and Nelson Mandela he spent 16 years and 14 days in prison under al-Assad's flower as he said he was a 19 year old medical student in Aleppo he was a member of a communist party like in Syria there was an official communist party who was a party leader as he said they were about a peaceful political activity not a drop of blood was shed not a penny was stolen by them but because as he said as he made the point for a career in Syria you could be an Islamist you could be a Marxist anything as long as you're obedient but the moment you step out of life you will be tortured you will be imprisoned and you will pay a very high price like deeded he's a remarkable figure because in one person he sums up what's really happening in Syria and how the people who risked so much for democracy are really caught between the regime on one side and a kind of certain jihadist elements even in Aleppo they were by no means the majority of Aleppo they weren't a minority I would say the al-Qaeda based element but because in Aleppo for example it wasn't very much about civil society or education but for example his wife was kidnapped by the jihadist in Douma she became one of the Douma 4 and Razan Zaytouni who will be internationally renowned as a civic democratic activist in the opposition at the time she was also kidnapped with two others and they've never been heard from since and his brother was murdered by ISIS in Raqqa so he uniquely and of course the regime put him in prison for 16 years so you see he suffers at the hands of the jihadis on one side ISIS at another level and at the hands of the regime and that's the high price people pay in their support for democracy and it really always breaks my heart again and that's a rather pathetic way to say it I commit when I see demonstrations against certain jihadist elements in opposition areas the death and commitment that democracy has really that has taken root it just reminds me hopefully when you see the documentary you may share that view that something very fundamental that's happened in Syria there is that genuine commitment for a real commitment a real desire for freedom for dignity and for social justice but of course at this stage let's be truthful about it does appear that the opposition from a military point of view has of course been effective and crushed and I just mentioned the failure of the west to support the nationalist opposition if you like which might be called the Syrian army as such which was formed when the crackdown really began in Syria very early by soldiers and officers that affected the Syrian army that used to kill the European army that really was the backbone of the Paternity Army support and the only people who did get support on the opposition side were jihadist elements and this is a huge tragedy the Saudis, the Qatari's and the Turks backed those groups so you had this automatic imbalance in the opposition and worse still the United Nations in the delivery of aid and this is something we didn't really go into very much in the documentary but I'll be honest we're working on something other at the moment the way aid has been illiterate by the regime in fact it is one of the great scandals that is coming to light now that UN humanitarian aid which US taxpayers, I as a taxpayer have contributed to us was fundamental in backrolling the Assad regime in fact it's debasable whether that vital life line provided by the UN because this was given to the Assad and they were supposed to give that to areas under siege but what they would do is they didn't even send the aid to their own areas such as the level of corruption amongst the regime and Dr. Ali Sparrow a renowned humanitarian and pediatrician who's done amazing work in Syria on vaccination programs even just in the last two weeks before the thought a profound and compelling testament are taking this and I just want to give the government a bit of a headache but we're taking over some UN coordination with the UN and we will have an opportunity to exert some influence on that and I certainly hope it's something the institute might be interested in taking up as a research topic because it is one area where our resources have been used directly to the regime and the way aid should be given is on the cross-border where gold and trokers have been involved so our own agencies seem to know of the right way to try to distribute that aid rather than bankroll in the regime now I don't want to go off on a tangent which of course because of the nature of this topic and because you haven't seen the documentary I've been tempted to do a couple of times this evening but I just want to get back to Gassin at the House selling because he's written a book called The Impossible Revolution in Eureka we filmed an interview with him in Turkey we caught on famously with him a very nice guy when people call him tourist as they regularly do accusing him of being al-Qaeda and so forth I mean you would never be a secular individual let me tell you but a more you know person more committed to what we value democracy but the sacrifices that he has personally made he would of course assume that to really say he managed to escape from Syria in 2013 because they were looking for him and he had not escaped I can assure you he would be dead now he would have been tortured to death without a shadow like many other needing opposition but it is personally kind of embodies that spirit that's still very much there and what I really want I didn't want to sort of sit here tonight and say if we had bombed Syria earlier or if we had given the opposition military an area everything will be grand and old I don't want to leave that message with you what I want to say is and I really hope you do see the documentary because if we had supported those people and risked their lives peacefully for democracy if we refused to sit idly by and say to the sad regime no we will not tolerate you massacring people who had great personal risk took to the streets for the very things we take for granted we will not tolerate that 500,000 plus people will not be dead in Syria today it's because the whole debate about the Middle East is spraying in that geopolitical realistic kind of fray that we end up where we are and indeed even the way politicians approach it like Obama really would be and I know some of you know a little about maybe some of you maybe far more expert in international relations than I have though I wouldn't say that I came to Cleveland out in London to prevent myself getting bored I'm actually doing yet another last degree in international relations which actually was a very useful thing to do at the time because I did actually meet quite a lot of people as well I thought it might be an unfortunate distraction but it actually proved to be very valuable but the point about international relations which Obama put down as one of the most ruthless realists who perhaps have the intellectual resources to appreciate what he was doing but as I hope someday to meet with him to remind him that the risk he took in Syria was very silly because the very things the Orandi is supposed to achieve even if Trump hadn't taken it was already forming I don't know how many of you are aware but the Houthis of Yemen actually fired a ballistic missile at Ria a ballistic missile this bunch of people who in fairness would not be known for manufacturing ballistic missiles as in the hills where they're from in other words the Iranians no longer make ballistic missiles so the Sunni Shia Civil War really Saudi-Iranian competition in the Middle East had already reached a very serious pinch because of the grotesque scale of Iranian influence in Syria and the Saudis showed their contempt for Syrian people as well by only harming Jihadis and of course the Saudis are known as whatsoever democracy in Syria and it explains the internationalization of that conflict in regional terms but also in global terms because it brings in the United States and it brings in the Russians as we know because of the Assad regime in a profound way and this is the other point before the Israelis really because Israel and the Iranians in Syria now you've seen the newspaper reports my bigger fear though was there would be the potential still exist though very seriously for a kind of a Saudi-Iranian war which actually would not take very long it would be an air war it would be over very quickly but everybody in this room and I emphasize that and I think if you reflect on it you probably will agree with me will be economically fairly seriously effected because the first thing that's going to be destroyed on both sides are their oil production facilities the Americans of course will come in on the side of the Saudis but before they get a chance it would not take very much for the Iranians to block the channels but which the oil escapes from the Middle East to the usual commercial channels in the worst way of saying it is the Middle East is more volatile today than it's ever been but all roads lead back to Syria the failure of the West to stand up for Western values and by that I mean the failure of you and I to stand with Syrian Democrats as individuals as communities that they would have been slaughtered have left us far less secure today and trumped sabotage sabotage of the Iranians while on the face of it looks like a shall we say a reckless thing to do but in fact I'm a little nervous but I must have to be honest it may not prove to be the most disastrous of things because there is no way whatsoever in spite of the alleged opposition of the Gulf states to Israel we're all going to be here if you have any interest in the Saudi alliance that was formed in the Saudis of the Israelis long when Obama clearly showed that overbearing interest in this Iran deal were well aware of its implications in regional terms indeed I've even seen stories with the Saudis to human the Israelis were even involved in certain forming arrangements in the occupied territories which I'm sure of course it could be just fake news but anyway the bottom line is that Saudi-Israeli coalition is real and very bitter it varies both sides I suppose what the other to take on the Israelis and at the moment the Israelis have certainly obliged the Saudis that's a frighteningly serious situation the sabotaging of the Iran deal and the life you potentially might cool the situation but the truth is the potential benefit because at the moment and I should really stop now because I know I have I may appear to ramble but it is a big picture subject and you know when you see the documentary a lot of the pieces will fit together but the reason that conflict is so serious is the risk of bringing in the Saudis I would suggest that the sabotaging of the Iran deal and Trump makes that less likely for the time being because obviously we as the Iranians sit further in terms of their economy from my point of view as somebody who initially thought the Iran deal might appear to offer some hope of course but the truth is the Iran deal offers the Iranians economic power it offers them more economic energy you know more resources and where they want to deploy that the Iranian economy is all bankrupt because of its massive involvement in Syria and it's not because they like the Syrians this gives the Saudis if you look at the map it gives the Iranians that famous sheer crescent it gives a huge influence in the Middle East there is serious smack back in the Middle Region and the Iranians are not effectively controlled except for Israeli in terms of the map here but the Iranians aren't firmly entrenched in and right across to the Lebanon the meanwhile of course the Iranians continue recklessly in fairness to engage in Yemen where the Saudis have also shamelessly engaged the ordinary civilians I mentioned the ballistic attack from Yemen under Saudi capital so you see this resurgent Iranian power now like it or not in spite of its relative economic weakness is the regional hegemon which alarms the Saudis and the other Gulf states in spite of the Qataris that have tipped for the Saudis and we know the Israelis are not border tolerated Iranian bases in Syria now we naturally myself concluded I have a big problem with the Israelis because of their high quality of occupation I do alienate a lot of my Israeli friends by that they always have robust discussions with me about that but I think on any objective basis they really have a case to answer the way they run that occupation but the bottom line in geopolitical terms is Iranian bases in Syria it's not just provocation it clearly destabilizes the region and the reason I end my few words now I'm just making that observation as well about the potential threat to global stability because there you have a complex a volatile situation now which potentially affects us very seriously I will not underestimate because if you consider most wars often start to miscalculation by accident and so forth in such a volatile region like the Middle East at the moment it's not inconceivable to see that regional war but ironically the so-called Iranian which is supposed to stop that happening has actually made it perhaps somewhere closer now that it's been sabotaged there may yet be an opportunity for Syria because it deprives the Israelis of key resources and I really must as I thought I have a chance to say it in question that's the case I don't I must talk about it but I think it's very important to understand that Syria effectively every time Siege's end people are exported with it there's more than 2.5 billion civilians living in it more than half of the population in the Commonwealth area these are civilians families who have been children that were bound to multiple times they have fled multiple times from different areas and now they're all in England Jean Aglent the Norwegian who are there for the UN in various roles on the humanitarian side has repeatedly warned about the risk of a catastrophe I want to say that catastrophe has already started because the Russians and the Assad regime are running by the situation in England is something that can be averted it must be averted but it's a continuation of what has happened in the rest of Syria because a sad strategy from the beginning when I'm going to finish now the civilians terrorists when they went out of the street he released jihadis from prison to try to poison that opposition in fact many people released it as a successful strategy as many of them ended up in leadership positions in many of the terrorist groups he's still calling them terrorists he calls England basically people in England as terrorists and you will notice this is something carefully implemented a large earth strategy where the primary targets of all regime bombing raids and the Russians is always to target civilians they bomb the hospitals bakeries, schools because the aim is always to move civilians on it's always to get them out of opposition to get them moving that's why England is such a humanitarian catastrophe at the moment because they've been moved so many times I also see major engineer with Iranian she has been brought into areas in Syria where Syrian Sunnis have been ejected again this is that regime this tradition of exploiting sectarianism to maneuver the country but England has seen the Iranians now very much engineering the creation of the new Syria to embed the regime very firmly and also obviously to reach the position itself which is of course the most destabilizing thing in life for one of the Saudis and the Israelis as I say there is a silver lining potentially in the sabotage of Iran but I do think people who protest against that sabotage they write these letters about Iran and it's some kind of democracy when Iran has used so much of its resources for what it wants to it is in my period of expansion in the region it just beggars on the leaf I should stop there before I just give a chance to ask questions I did kind of sweep across the campus in the region but it's what makes it so fascinating really but the document is just for what I've said in the context that's very