Syria's defiant women risk all to protest against President Bashar al-Assad

[Turborama]

Source: The Guardian

Women on the frontline of demonstrations against Syria's brutal regime are now being targeted by security forces
Peter Beaumont | Saturday May 21 2011 18.45 BST

They came for the men first, as the security forces of Syria's President Bashar al-Assad killed, beat and arrested people protesting against his regime.

Next, they came for the women of Syria's revolution. Despite the threats, however, they refuse to be silenced.

As the violence has become worse, women activists have organised a Friday protest of Free Women showing solidarity with those seized or killed. Women-only protests in towns across the country have led the effort to let the outside world know what is happening in Syria. But they are now being targeted as well, with the same lethal brutality.

Two weeks ago three women were shot dead at an all-women march near the besieged city of Banias. A week later human rights activist Catherine al-Talli, 32, was detained in the Barzeh district of Damascus after being forced off a minibus when it was stopped at a checkpoint by the secret police.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/21/syria-women-unrest-repression

---

Syrian human rights activist: 'The regime has been rattled by the protests' - video
Human rights activist and lawyer 'Ameera' (not her real name) describes the situation on the ground in Syria
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2011/may/22/syrian-human-rights-protests-video

Click on the banner for Al Jazeera English's regularly updated special section on the uprisings in Syria...

http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/spotlight/syria/">

[vandelay]

1. Assad is 10 times the bad guy Quadaffi is.

But his own people need to free themselves as people all over the world must. I am anti-war, but I don't have a problem with handing oppressed people the gun they need to take their own country back.

[naaman fletcher]

2. Chavez stands behind Syrian leader

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/americas/05/20/venezuela.chavez.syria/index.html

[Countdown_3_2_1]

3. Dictators of a feather, flock together.

No surprise here.