Syrian war intensifies
Newshour
BBC
4.2 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 2 December 2024
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Syrian civil war, which has left around half a million people dead, began in 2011 after the Assad government responded to pro-democracy protests with a brutal crackdown. The conflict has been largely dormant since a ceasefire agreed in 2020, but opposition forces have maintained control of the north-western city of Idlib and much of the surrounding province. According to reports from the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, opposition fighters seized nearly all of the city of Aleppo from the government on Sunday except for the neighbourhoods controlled by Kurdish forces. Syria’s military withdrew from the city to prepare a counteroffensive. We hear from those caught up in the fighting. Also on the programme: a rare report from West Darfur in Sudan; and how an old term - ‘’brain-rot’’ - became the new word of the year. (Picture: Syrian rebels take control of military and civilian airports in Aleppo, Syria. Credit: Bilal al Hammoud/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to NewsHour from the BBC World Service. |
| 0:07.2 | Coming to you live from London, I'm Celia Hatton. |
| 0:10.2 | Well, coming up in 30 minutes, our chief international correspondent, Lee's Doucette, |
| 0:15.2 | reports from a place where few journalists go, |
| 0:18.3 | West Darfur in Sudan, which has been a hot spot in 19 months of fighting. |
| 0:23.1 | Well, there's still an accurate taste in the air. |
| 0:28.9 | It's smell. This place was burning. |
| 0:35.3 | The shops are charred. The doors blown over. |
| 0:43.9 | This is where gunmen went on a rampage. |
| 0:49.8 | That in half an hour's time. |
| 0:51.9 | But first, we're going to start with the fast-moving situation in Syria. |
| 0:56.5 | The conflict there suddenly sprung to life again after the civil war had reached a stalemate. |
| 1:02.2 | Bashir al-Assad's government retained power, leaving about a third of the country in the hands of opposition forces. |
| 1:08.7 | Some of those rebels, backed by Turkey, broke the stalemate when |
| 1:12.1 | they burst into President Assad's territory, pushing east from their stronghold in Idlib |
| 1:17.8 | to capture Syria's second largest city, Aleppo on Saturday. Elipo's two million people are now |
| 1:24.6 | adjusting to their new reality. And now the rebels are moving swiftly south, and hours drive further on, they say they've |
| 1:33.2 | reached the outskirts of another hub, the city of Hama. |
| 1:36.5 | It's home to just under a million people, and it's a key stop on the way to the capital, |
| 1:41.6 | Damascus. |
| 1:42.8 | The Sviders spearheading this new push are from the Islamist militant group Hayat Harir al-Sham, |
| 1:49.0 | or HTS. |
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