Hello from Bush House in London, home to From Our Own Correspondent.

You can hear the World Service edition of our programme by going to the From Our Own Correspondent

website, but this is a download of the latest broadcast on Radio 4.

It's introduced by Kate Adi.

Today, the farmers, mechanics, greengrocers and students now taking up arms in Syria. Gales of laughter as we talk politics

to three opposition leaders in Burma, free at last after long prison sentences.

We meet a Kenyan man who, after a hard day's work comes home to 49 children and find out how

the internet's brought love to a remote beach in Costa Rica. European leaders emerged from their summit in Brussels yesterday, warning that those responsible

for what they called the appalling crimes in Syria will be held to account.

And last night, the UN Secretary Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told the

UN General Assembly in New York that the Syrian authorities had committed clear

and widespread crimes against their civilian population. An aid convoy yesterday was prevented from entering the

besieged suburb of Baba Amar in the city of Homps. The district has been shelled by government

forces for weeks and many people have died.

Conditions are said to be dire, with snow and freezing temperatures, no electricity and no heating fuel.

Stocks of food, water and medical supplies are all said to be running low.

Away from Holmes, Syria's Third City, it's hard to assess the extent of the rebellion against

President Al-Assad.

Ian Panell has just spent eight days in the rural north of the country, close to the border with Turkey.

I am a fish out of water.

The teacher looked up from his worn copy at the Collins

book of English idioms grinned and nodded to me for approval at his use of the

...