21/01/2013 Newsnight

Tonight, after the could have fips and the wreckage of the Algerian

hostage crisis, the Prime Minister sets out his plan for fighting

international terrorism. More than ever this evolving threat demands

an international response. It must be one that is tough, intelligent,

patient, and based on strong international partnerships.

It sounded like an important change of strategy, but what will it

amount to in practice? We will hear from diplomats, soldiers and

analysts whether Africa is the new frontline in an endless campaign.

From relatives mourning those they loved. But we actually had to find

out for ourselves, we were not given any official information. It

was through Facebook of all things that we found out of Kenny's demise.

We are in Mali, on the streets of newly-liberated Diabaly.

TRANSLATION: We heard the helicopters, so did the rebels,

most of them ran to hide in the houses nearby, afterwards the

rebels told us they just want to impose Sharia Law here. Plus, in

Syria, where foren intervention is off the international agenda,

devastation and apparent normality, just minutes away from each other

in the city of Homs. The final death toll in the

Algerian oil siege is unknown, it could be 48 dead, at least three

British. The Prime Minister in a tone some found reminiscent of Tony

Blair after 9/11, promised a long, hard fight and an intelligent

political response. To the terrorist threat against British

workers interests and allies. And what might that all mean, and with

Barack Obama telling Americans on his Inaugration Day that a decade

of war is now over, what kind of leadership can we now expect. We

begin our coverage on the new frontline of the conflict on Mali,

where French troops push back Islamist rebels from the town of

Diabaly, the beginning of what could be a long and difficulty

conflict. We report on a day of triumph for the French, and

setbacks for the rebels. France takes another step deeper

into this conflict. Crossing here into what was rebel-held territory

in central Mali. We have come with them to the down of Diabaly,

controlled until this weekend by Islamist militants, some may still

be in the area. The French quickly begin to check

the nearby houses. But the population seems relaxed now. And

relieved. They are keen to show us the

wreckage of their week-long ordeal. TRANSLATION: These are pick-up

trucks, destroyed by French helicopters, two Jihadists were

killed here. We find seven more charred vehicles nearby. They were

hit with great precision, French Special Forces presumably helping

to direct the air strikes. TRANSLATION: We heard the

helicopters, so did the rebels, most of them ran to hide in the

houses nearby. Afterwards the rebels told us they just want to

impose Sharia Law here. What do you think of Sharia Law? TRANSLATION:

We don't want it. It doesn't suit us here. The Islamists chose to

attack this town for a reason. This is it, the army garrison, packed

with weapons, and not nearly as well guarded as you might expect.

The rebels, some suggest more than 100 of them, seized the town in a

day. The Islamists have left now, French air strikes clearly did

their job. But before they left the rebels had every chance to loot

this huge arsenal, giving them plenty of weapons for the war ahead.

Right now the battle here is over, but Mali's hit-and-run insurgency

may be just beginning. So who were the men who came to

Diabaly? We found only one unidentifiable body. But more have

been buried in town. The rebels' survivors withdrew across these

fields heading east, according to the French. After a year of defeats,

the mally army seems keen to chase after them now. TRANSLATION:

around us it is fine, with the help of French troops it is reassuring.

But we must search and search for more, there may still be a few

pockets of enemy resistance. French politely insist they are

keen to let Mali's demoralised army do its share of the fighting here.

But from what we have learned in Diabaly today, it is clear this

army is part of the problem. This soldier, Dioncounda Traore, has

agreed to show me why, he's based at the garrison, and hid in town

when it was overrun. The Islamists came to his home here

to look for him, and trashed his belongings. He says some of the

rebels are foreign Jihadist, but he knows others are former colleagues

from his own army unit. Do you know the names of these people, would

you recognise them? TRANSLATION: Yes, they defected last year when

the Tuareg started their rebellion. When they came back last week they

were Islamist, I think they are just after money. People believe

the rebels are rich. Outside another soldier confirmed the story.

TRANSLATION: Yes, many of our comrades became our enemies, now we

will hunt them down and kill them all.

The threat posed by foreign Islamist militants is real here,

but the fact that some of the men who appear to have attacked this

town were actually former members of the Mali army is a reminder of

how many of this country's problems are home-grown.

No simple solutions here, then, for Mali's complex mercury rebellion.

-- murky rebellion. I'm joined now by the editor of the

BBC of a frik ka service, which broadcasts too in French to Africa.

Can Mali actually be stablised, do you think? That is the difficult

and complex question to answer now. What the French and the mally army,

and later on the west African troops, will be doing, is to at

least secure the south. So far that is what they are doing, the north

is still under the control of the insurgent s, the Islamist, part of

it. The other answer is political, if you go south of Mali where there

is a President, this President is really fragile in his ruling. It is

an interim President, put there by the west African leaders, because

there was a coup in March, right before the democratic elections,

and then you have the north issues, which are not just the Islamist

insurgent issue, it is a Tuareg issue, it is a Malian issue. Do the

mallyian Tuareg have pushed out the Islamist insurgents to be -- will

the mallyian army who have pushed out the Islamist terrorists be able

to solve the Tuareg issue, which is more complicated than the Islamist

issue. I wonder what is at stake for the neighbours, I don't just

mean Algeria and Morocco, but those to the south, it must be a

difficult situation for awful them? That is why the west African army

wanted to go in. They can't go in, because it is complicated. If you

take the Tuareg issue, it is not only Mali, it is also Moritania,

which doesn't want to be involved at all in the mally operation. Then

you have Niger, which has its own Tuareg problems, where they were

able there to sort out the issues there. Then you have all the small

countries, which are all stable but in a fragile state. They are all

worried? About the Islamist insurgents, if you push them out of

Mali they might find somewhere else in there, which is as vast as the

European continent, where will they go next? Because Algeria is

blocking its border, then it would be difficult for other countries by

themselves to secure their own desert area. We will pick up some

of those issues in a moment. Relatives of those missing after

terrorists stormed the gas plant in Algeria have spent an agonising few

days trying to get information, and sadly, for some, their worst fears

have been realised. The White Tiger family found out about their son

and brother's death through Facebook. We met up and asked about

the circumstances of finding out about their brother's killing.

know now what's happened to Kenny, and we actually had to find out for

our selves, we were not given any official information. It was

through Facebook, of all things, that we found south of Kenny's

demise. It was my daughter found it on

Facebook, a message from an Algerian co-worker. So, if you like

a, an unofficial confirmation, you didn't get anything official from

the authorities? The police came last night and informed us that

what was on Facebook was true, that Kenny had been, he was executed.

Can I say before we go on, I'm very sorry for your loss, and I'm very

grateful for you speaking to us in these circumstances. Can I ask you

what you feel about the way that the situation was handled in

Algeria? Well, it is just the way life is, I'm afraid. I don't hold

any grudges against Algeria and the army or anything, that's the way

they work. That's their system. They weren't bothered about the

hostages as such, they just wanted to get the camp cleared of all the

terrorists. That was the main objective. As far as I could see.

Had Kenny been working out there for some time? It must be about

five years, I think, he has been working in Algeria. And in that

time had he expressed any concerns about safety, about how their

safety was, and how they were protected out there? That sort of

thing never bothered Kenny. He has worked all over the world, he just

didn't think about it. So he was well used to working in difficult

places, and trouble spots? Yes, more or less. He has worked all

over Africa, Zambia, South Africa, Russia's been around. He knew what

the game was all about. What was the job that he did? He was

actually he went out there as a fitter to trade, with Babcock &

Wilcox but worked himself up. His official title was planning manager,

project manager. He was head hunted, he was obviously very good at his

job, he was head hunted for a few jobs. In the light of what's

happened, and we hear this morning that there is quite a high death

toll amongst the hostages, what are your feelings about what needs to

be done to protect men and women that are out there in similar

circumstances in the future? honestly don't think you could do

anything. Not any more than was done already. They had security

guards, but you can't guard every installation all over the world,

just because of these fanatics. If they are going to attack, they will

do it, you know. What has happened in Algeria and Mali is all at the

same time an international incident, a security to energy -- security

threat to energy companies, and danger to local people, and a

threat to Governments. With David Cameron promising a response that

is tough, intelligent and patient, and based on international

partnerships. We're going to assess some of the options open to Mr

Cameron and other Government leaders. It sounds like it is a

very big change for Mr Cameron, is it, in terms of strategy? You would

certainly think so, from the statement he gave in the palace of

Westminster today. He was quite explicit about a number of themes.

You got a sense from him of a certain focus, or priority that was

once really dominating our security considerations giving way to

another. That was articulated quite clearly in the Commons. This attack

underlines the threat that terrorist groups pose to the

countries and peoples of that region, and to our citizens, our

companies and our interests too. Four years ago the principal threat

from Islamist extremism came from the Afghanistan and Pakistan region.

A huge amount has been done to address and reduce the scale of

that threat. Where as at one point three-quarters of the most serious

terrorist plots against the UK had links to that region, today this

has reduced to less than half. Listening to that, you could think

that he was suggesting that as UK forces draw down in Afghanistan

over the next year or year-and-a- half, the UK will increasingly be

ready to put its shoulder to the wheel in North Africa? We heard

from Brahimi a few moments ago, about what is at stake in Africa.

Could Britain play a part in shaping the whole regional

strategy? It could play a part. But there are all sorts of barriers to

how extensive and influential a part it could play. This draw down

in Afghanistan isn't happening quite as quickly as the ramping up

you might want in North Africa if you were really going to put troops

on the ground. That very point is clearly one of some sensitivity to

Downing Street. They are not out to send hundreds of troops in there

straight away. They are trying to work to build up relationships,

diplomatic, intelligence, military- to-military, the sort of thing they

have been doing in quite a few African countries. There are some

really difficult challenges here. Most particularly, the attitudes of

the host Government, the all goreian Government, we saw their

attitude -- Algerian Government, we saw their attitude to those trying

to get involved in the negotiating and political level in the crisis.

They will be very reluctant to take in the outside forces, and France

and others have stronger security ties with them. Libya, of course,

NATO very involved there in overthrowing the Gaddafi regime,

but they have been reluctant to accept military advisers from NATO

countries. It is a delicate atmosphere operating there even, it

would be hard for the UK to put its very limited resources, diplomatic,

intelligence whatever into this sensitive scenario. Lots of legal

potential difficulties too. On the intelligence side, the Algerian

Government, the way it treats terrorist subjects, quite strict

rules on what intelligence we could share with them. Where is the

United States on this? The US appears ready to look at a great

many international crises that develop now from the sidelines.

President Obama was inaugurated today for his second term, and this

sense of his focus so much being on the domestic, was quite clearly in

the peach -- clear in the speech he gave at his inauguration. This

generation of Americans has been tested by crises that steeled our

resolve and proved our resilience. A decade of war is now ending. An

economic recovery has begun. clearly he wants to keep the focus

domestic, economic, social. He doesn't want to involve himself in

new wars, we know that from the past year. That has implications

for North Africa, it also has implications for Iran, and the

world much more widely, siria. Potentially a very significant

statement from Syria. Potentially a very significant statement from

President Obama today. We have a former UK ambassador in Washington

with us, we have the a former US Ambassador for the United Nations,

we have an Algerian born political analyst, he advises companies that

operate in the region. And the CEO of Keyhaven, who specialise in

crisis management, former director of defence management in the MoD.

Your roots are in the region, how serious do you think the issue s or

is it anything less than banditry? It is a serious threat to the

region and international security. You have a region that is

increasingly unstable as a result of some of the power vacuums have

taken place, or that are currently in place in Libya and northern Mali.

You have terrorists, or Jihadi groups have been able to utilise

this new safe haven, this vast territory that is uncontrolled, and

poorly monitored, in terms of surveillance, by the states, and to

utilise that, not only for financial gain through the drug

trade, and through arms proliferation, but also through the

type of techniques we have seen now in these kinds of hostage crises.

You were also involved in the threat assessment business, we have

heard everything from cigarette snugling, drug running, the arms

business, to just making a profit out of hostages. It is difficult to

distinguish that from what seems to be happening now, which we are also

told there are links to the establishment of a Kalafate

throughout north Africa. Is this a quantitatively different threat

from just the banditry? It indicate the number of shared incentives,

and what we will see is a kol alllessing and breaking apart of

different movements. The analogy I would like to use is it is like a

balloon, you squeeze it in one place and you get an expansion

somewhere else. Going back to late 2001, the operation in Afghanistan,

you had people seeking refuge in Pakistan and Yemen, you squeeze

them in Yemen and then Somalia, that is getting better, and they go

elsewhere. This is a concerted effort working with other

Governments, if necessary behind the scenes. The incentives for the

bad people are many, and the interests are many. Do you think

there is an ideolgical underpinning to some of this? To some of this.

To a certain extent. 0 these groups are using this narrative to --

these groups are using the narrative to create a network in

the region. They have been able to attract militants from Boko Haram,

from Nigeria, a narrative that bring these groups to a shared

interests. If this is such a big threat, shouldn't we have seen it

coming? Absolutely. I think it was predictable as an outcome of the

Libya vacuum. This is the underbelly of the Arab Spring. You

are seeing a rise up, after the end of the Cold War, of all these

tensions coming forward. The fact that the Tuaregs were heavily armed

to protect Gaddafi, and then decided to go home, should have

been a trigger point for stronger international intervention in the

north to try to make sure that we nipped this in the bud. We were,

the world was looking elsewhere, and really we have a triple tragedy

going on, the Tuaregs moving in with arms, the Islamists taking

over, and the Government being over thrown in Bamako, it is a perfect

storm and the people of Mali pay the price. We heard President Obama

making what was largely a big domestic speech on his Inaugration

Day, I wondered if it was a case of the American administration, the

British, tired of war in Afghanistan, not really wanting to

know about this. If it was right under our noses? I wouldn't read

too much into the lack of a long and foreign policy speech on an

inaugural speech. It was a short speech, there was a few sentences

about democracy throughout Africa and the need to make sure we

address the problems there, and finish the war. We are tired of war,

we have been at war for over ten years in Afghanistan, and finally

got out of Iraq. The American people are very wary of it. No

President in his inaugural will talk much about it. President Obama

understands the need to make sure there is not another safe haven for

Al-Qaeda in the heart of Africa. I think you will see a stronger

action on this. But don't expect much in the big speeches. I think

you will see him moving forward on many of these fronts. How serious

do you view this, and is it serious enough that, despite the reluck

tannance on the British Government's part, -- reluctance on

the British Government's part, we will see boots on the ground at

some point in the region? If there are going to be boots on the ground

at some point, there must be a very clear military objective for the

action. One of the things we have learned from Afghanistan, is troops

without a clear political plan are a west of time. That is why we have

not made the -- a waste of time. That is why we haven't made the

progress in Afghanistan we would have liked to make. We had Iraq a

Millerry -- military push and it led to the war of unintended

consequences. What about the French? Is it just a short-term

military operation to hold the line until the African troops turn up,

or are they intending to create a political ring in which there can

be some kind of negotiation between the Tuaregs in the north, who want

independence, or autonomy, and the Government in the south. This is

not yet clear, until these things are clear, you shouldn't even think

of putting boots on the ground. That is, you put your finger on the

nub of it. There are 2,000 French troops on the ground, you have

boots on the ground. The French are going to find it very difficult to

come in very late with very few troops. They have 2,000, they said

maybe 4,000. So they are in there. I think it is going to get very

messy. What should have happened is the US, France, the international

community could have reinforced the mally Government to address the --

Mali Government to address the Tuareg initial phases of the

military and get immediately into negotiations. The Tuaregs have

tired over decades from Bamako of more development in the north that

have never come to fruition. What you have to have is the French who

need help, the west Africans come in, there is not many capable west

Africans they can fight, they can certainly help secure peace. It

will eventually be turned over to a UN operation. Kprair this to the

Ivory Coast, when -- compare this to the Ivory Coast when they had

17,000 troops there and the French had more troops going in, it will

be messy before it gets better. terms of the messiness, you talked

about presumably having a negotiation between a Government in

the mally capital and the taurs, except this is a Government that

came to power because of military coup, and the one-eyed cigarette

dialer who is responsible for this is not -- dealer who is responsible

for this is not able to negotiate? This has as many layers as a club

sandwich. There isn't a threat for the west, there are threats. What

we faced in Algeria was a sovereign state with a capable military force

and Special Forces has been against oil and gas installations where

Brits are working who have been tragically killed, that was a

specific British interest, go to Mali and you have a failed state.

It is not clear they can be put back together again. The threat is

different in Algeria from in Mali, from elsewhere in the countries.

The one thing we have to watch out for, where there is another British

interest, does it infect, more than you refer to, Nigeria? Can we talk

about the options, particularly the military option right now. You have

got 40 armed people, apparently, going to attack a remote plant,

with 6600 civil -- 600 civilian workers under a good security

apparatus, it is hard to see how you can protect these exposed

plants from people who don't care how many they kill or how they die

themselves? I agree, there is no such thing as perfect and complete

protection. What all the different oil and gas interests will need to

be reassured about is the continuing and ined effort to

protect their people. In the short- term they can increase promises

security, they can clampdown on people's movement, the engineers

going to and fro. Come back to your point, if you have a really

determined bunch of people who have planned the operation for some time,

they have arms and weapons on their side, there is not much that can

stand in their way. But, there is more which can be done. My own

personal experience relates to some of the borders, physically the

borders between the countries. I remember for instance, for example,

two or three years ago on the border between Algeria and Libya,

and going down to view a border crossing point, deep in The Sahara.

What was interesting to me is the fact that place closed up at night.

One could see hundreds of sets of footprints, illegal movement across

the border. More can be done in a cheap and cheerful way. Not to

solve the problem, but at least to bear down and make the borders less

porous. I wondered whether the context of this is, is there an

African solution to what is fundamentally an African problem?

Ultimately the Africans are going to need to solve these problems.

The problem is right now in the short-term crises, they don't have

the military capacity to move. The UN has authorised 3,000 troops to

go into northern Mali, recognising in the same resolution that they

are not capable of doing so. To the hostage crisis in Algeria, first of

all, our hearts go out to those who have lost their lives, it is a

tragedy. But you are going to watch obviously heightened security

around any kind of foreign oil installation. But you will watch,

and the all goreians have a history of a counter punch on these kinds

of things, they will go after many of these militants, it is likely to

get blody. Ultimately you will have to have kiebd -- bloody, ultimately

vul to have some kind of engagment on these issues. We know withhold

hold, he went to Algeria and didn't apologise, quite, and said France

had done some terrible things. And the UN mandate stipulated this was

an African problem to be solved by Africans, revolving the situation

was a job for them, and that they hadn't learned a single lesson. Is

it a post colonial problem so it is difficult for outsiders to get

involved? It depends who you are asking. One thing for sure, the UN

mandate and the plan to give Africans the full control of the

situation, and have them intervene in Mali, came too late. The delay,

which the African force could only intervene in September, and said it

could only intervene in September. No western powers stepped up to the

plate, like France, for example, to facilitate their preparation for an

operation. That delay gave these terror groups,s they Jihadi groups,

the window and mandate they needed, to prepare -- these Jihadi groups,

the window and mandate they needed to prepare for the assault on

Bamako. One of the key things France should have done was put

more power, and western states, more power in the hands of African

state. What do you think of that? The trouble of this, I will go back

on something that was said, you can empower the UN to authorise

thousands of west African troops to come in and hold the line, but they

actually aren't militarily capable and don't have the logistics to do

it. Time and time again they show themselves want anything this

respect. Doesn't that say to the French you have to do something now,

your point is we have to figure out what we are doing there politically,

presumably, as seen from the Elysee, this is something that can't wait

and you have to get in? Ten or 15 years Agatha might have been an

automatic response on the part of the French. I think at the moment

budget cuts, plus colonial sensibilities make this a much more

difficult thing for the French to do than it might have been a

generation ago. That is one of the reasons you have this gap. Heaven

knows, 2,500 French troops, what difference in the long-term will

that make? I think the colonial problem you asked about a moment

ago is an on going responsibility to clean up certain problems. You

had Sierra Leone in the 1990s, the British went in there. You had most

recently the French in the Ivory Coast, we do Liberia. And since the

Africans are not yet capable of doing so, we are trying to train

them and get them up to speed, but it is another 10-20 years away, we

will always get called in. We wait too long to do it. In this case had

we reinforced the Government and got them up the north, perhaps,

this could have been nipped in the bud. But so long as there are these

crises and the Africans are not capable of addressing them, the

colonial challenge is it is hard to stand on the sidelines when you

have a human tragedy. You will see this going on. They were asked to

go in? They went in unilaterally. Do you see really room for

negotiation there? We talked about negotiating and the problems of the

Tuareg people and so on, but the actual people doing the killing, it

seems quite difficult to understand how you would negotiate anything

that they would want that you could possibly give them? A couple of

things. Somebody who has put this pair of boots in the ground on a

number of place, partly towards your point, Sir Christopher, the

military on its own can never be a solution on its own. Point number

two, to your point about the negotiation, yes, one must take a

longer term stance. Whilst there are people who went be swayed there

are people with different incentives and perhaps could see

where power shifts and could reorientate themselves to a more

benign way of living. This is not a totally homogeneous group, you have

mandatory smugglers, you have Tuaregs who want autonomy or

independence, you have the Jihadists moved by ideolgical moat

vagues. The purpose of negotiation is to split off, to divide this

coalition of groups. They don't have a lot instrinsically in common,

and try to -- intrinsicly in common and try to do deals with them.

Algeria pushed for that position early on to prefer the political

solution and negotiate with the groups that distinguish themselves

with others, and who had genuine grievances in the context of Mali,

for example, to differentiate them from other groups operating from

the 1990s in Algeria and elsewhere, with the Jihadi network. It is

important to make that point, I think.

Thank you all very much. To another significant part of this

arc of instability, stretching across Afghanistan, Syria. Barack

Obama's leadership, or some would say lack of it, has come under fire

in Washington, including the Washington Post newspaper. There is

no sign of direct action in that conflict, despite the daily

killings and misery. Almost a year ago the Syrian forces began a

sustained attack on Homs to drive out opposition fighters. We

reported last year, and we have returned to find out how it has

changed today. Some of the heaviest fighting of Syria's war happened

here. This neighbourhood, Baba Amr, came to symbolise a brutal conflict.

A ferocious Government offensive, after the opposition took up

positions here, was an assault on an entire community. Now, nearly

one year on, life is slowly returning to Baba Amr.

Rubbish collectors are on the job. A small sign the Government is back

on the street. That some families are starting to come home. I asked

him how life was here? He said it couldn't be better.

Stealing an anxious look at the soldiers escorting us.

A repair shop is back in business. It is not much of a bicycle, but

the man made it work. It is what life is like here.

TRANSLATION: Services are very good, before life was more difficult. But

now things are getting better day by day. It is still a fragile calm.

But good enough for children to play hopscotch on the treat --

street. Even they don't take notice when guns go off in the distance.

It is part of their life now. Scenes like this make you wonder,

what's it like to grow up here? The opposition is still present, still

fighting in other parts of Homs. (gunfire) Even in areas closer to

the city centre, it is like a ghost town. The battle for Homs isn't

over. No-one's really winning, no- one's really closing. When we came

here last spring this was no man's land, it still is. The Government

on this side, this is the historic old city. It has been under siege

for months. You can hear the crackle of gunfire right now.

Opposition fighters lie down these lanes, but so do civilians, trapped

in the middle. The old city has long been cherished by the people

of Homs. Look at it now. We couldn't travel in, this video

posted by activists on YouTube shows the toll a year-long siege

has taken on Homs's heritage. And the people who still live here, in

dire conditions. Aid agencies have been trying to get in for months.

Just minutes away, it feels like a different city. Even hard to

believe there is a war. Most of the people who live here back the

Government. It is predominantly Alawite, the same sect as President

Assad. Al-Mashei Pizzeria seems to be doing fine.

The owner tells me in areas loyal to the Government, life is good.

Even here, he says, they feel the effects of the war.

TRANSLATION: Not a month goes by without me having to close for

three or four days, either there is no gas, people aren't going out, or

because of the rockets. And there's a place to complain. At

the governor's office, local people air their grievances to the man in

charge. This mantles the Governor of Several requests, the most

important is bread, plus gas, fuel, water. It covers pretty well

everything. The governor reassures them their needs will be met. Then

it is my turn to ask questions. I put it to him that he's running a

divided city? TRANSLATION: Can you judge the situation of Homs by

looking at a few kilometres, a couple of neighbourhoods, Homs is a

big province, like the size of Holland, if you couldn't visit one

street, does that mean all of Homs is troubled? The areas that the

streets where there is still trouble and fighters, what are you

planning to do, are you going to push in there as well? As in you

did in Baba Amr to clear the I can't remember? TRANSLATION:

didn't do anything in Baba Amr. It wasn't us who did all this in Baba

Amr, it was these armed terrorist groups who kidnap the civilians and

blow up the buildings, the army had to push them out. We didn't blow up

the buildings. He receives the Greek or the docks head, before the

war there was people of all sects living in harmony. Here as

elsewhere, battles are drawn on sectarian lines. The bishop wants

to send a different message. belong to, not to this side or that

side, I'm in the middle. But I think that it is my epistle to the

world, that here in Syria we are not looking at each other as if we

are different groups, or different, let's say, religions, fighting each

other. But war is tearing at the fabric of

this city, neighbourhood by neighbourhood. We tried to advise

the mainly Sunni area of Derbalba, the Government told us it was too

dangerous, even though the Government took it back last month.

Much of Homs is under their control again, for now. But so much has

been lost here. There is so little trust. There is a checkpoint now on

almost every corner. This one is being manned by women. They call

themselves "The Lioness's" loyal to a President whose name means "the

lion". They are part of called Popular Committees, set up by the

Government to reinforce security. Putting a brave face on this war.

But there is no hiding what's gone on in Homs. What's happened across

Syria, and what more is still to come.

The kinds of conditions we found in Homs have echos elsewhere in Syria,

including Aleppo and Damascus. We have a PhD student in economics

at Brunel university and former residents in Syria. Did the scenes

in the piece correspond to how your family is living? It reminded me of

how my family are living back home in different places in Syria.

Giving you an example of my city, Deraa, it has been surrounded by

Assad forces for over 70 days now. 200,000 people fled out of this

city to the surrounding areas. They left without food, with lack of

fuel and water and heating, with this cold weather. Children dying

from hunger and cold weather. have not been back for about two

years. When you get sent pictures, or see pictures of where you are

from, the streets that you know so well, do you recognise it? Actually,

here is the very sad part of that, to be honest, when I look at some

pictures coming from my city, looking at the street, thinking

where is that street, do I know this city, is this actually my city.

It is like all the buildings are destroyed, schools and mosques and

all this, I don't recognise it. said 200,000 people have left the

city, you said they went to the surrounding area, to do what? Where

are they living? How are they living? They are living a miserable

life. They are living in the surrounding areas, like it's forest

or something like that, or other cities. Some how it is safer, but

they are living on very, very minor basis of life. They are struggling

to get bread, water and food and all these things. The electricity

is shut for ten hours, and it is like some of friends boasting on

Facebook saying if we are -- saying on Facebook, if they are not dying

from the rockets or the bullets but from the cold. On the one hand in

the film you see the awful scenes, and on the other hand you see

people eating pizzas, admittedly they can't always make them. Is

there a degree of normal life going on? In certain areas, but they are

pro-Assad, so the Government let them live their lives, they don't

interfere. One shout in an area, saying" Assad down", or" Assad step

down", or "free Syria", you will see massive bullets and massive put

down. Why aren't you treating your people equally? How long do you

think it will go on for, it must seem endless to you? To be honest

we don't know how long this will go on. As long as the fighting is

between the two parties, it is going on and on, it might go for

years, or it might end tomorrow. Nobody knows. So it should be like

some solution other than war. Now a quick look at tomorrow

morning's front page, quite a few The MoD is supporting French

efforts through logistical support, ministers are reviewing the