Welcome to the Inquiry Podcast from the BBC World Service with me Ruth Alexander.

Each week we bring you four expert witnesses answering one pressing question from the news.

The bodies lay out in the open on the hot dusty streets.

83 people, it was reported, with gun and knife wounds.

They'd been executed by so-called. with gun and knife wounds.

They'd been executed by so-called Islamic State.

Just before the militants had been driven out of town, Al-Karyatane, a small town built on an oasis in the desert of Central Syria.

These 83 weren't the only residents to lose their lives in the recent fighting.

This town has been through a living hell, but you might not have been aware of

it. Stories like this are horribly common in Syria, where a civil war is in its seventh year. They don't always hit

the headlines anymore. Civil wars are notoriously difficult to end, but they do end. In the inquiry this week we're going to try to

work out how serious might. We'll examine three civil wars elsewhere in the world

and how they were brought to an end to see what

lessons if any can be drawn for Syria. I'm Ruth Alexander and we're asking

how do you end a civil war.

Part 1. Military Might. military might. never forget the sight of those people sitting in my living room looking absolutely

shell-shocked at having barely escaped with their lives and being forced to flee their country.

Those people sitting in Rajesh Vanuagapal's living room were a Sri Lankan family who'd fled to India and been taken in by his parents.

They were in fact forced to witness their home burning in front of their own eyes in a horrible

ride that took place in July 1983 that actually kicked off the civil war.

Rajesh Vanu Gupal, our first expert witness, is now at the London School of Economics, where he

researches the Civil War in Sri Lanka.

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