Horrified New Yorkers witnessed the grim reality of life in Syria as they viewed graphic photographs smuggled out of the war-torn country.
An exhibition of gruesome torture images showing eye gougings, strangulation and the effects of long-term starvation, is being staged at the city’s United Nations headquarters.
About 25 pictures from a collection of 55,000 are on display this week, in an initiative sponsored by the US, Britain, France, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, as the conflict in Syria moves into its fifth year.
Some were visibly distressed as they viewed the horrific pictures, which were smuggled out of Syria between 2011 and mid-2013.
Former war crimes prosecutors have described the images as ‘clear evidence’ of systematic torture and mass killings in Syria’s three-year-long civil war.
They were taken by a former military police photographer who has been identified by the code name ‘Caesar’.
Britain’s UN Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant said the aim of the exhibition was to raise awareness of the human rights abuses that President Bashar al-Assad’s troops have been accused of committing against the Syrian people.
‘As the conflict in Syria enters its fifth year, the number of those killed and displaced has reached 220,000 and 7.6million, and over 3.8million
‘We hope that this exhibition will serve as a reminder of the imperative to pursue a political solution to the conflict with utmost urgency to end the suffering of the Syrian people.’
Syrian’s UN Ambassador Bashar Ja’afari was not immediately available for comment on the photos.
Caesar was a senior sergeant in Syria’s army who spent 13 years working as a forensic photographer, say former war crimes prosecutors who examined the photos.
Lawyers acting for Qatar commissioned the examination of the evidence. Qatar, like Saudi Arabia, is strongly opposed to Assad.
Between September 2011 and August 2013, Caesar worked at a military hospital, taking photos of bodies from three detention centres in the Damascus area. He smuggled copies of those photos out of the hospital on memory sticks hidden in his shoe.
The UN Security Council viewed the photos during an informal meeting last April.
Russia and China vetoed a bid in May to refer the situation in Syria to the International Criminal Court for possible prosecution of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the civil war.
The UN representative of the Syrian National Coalition, Najib Ghadbian, told The Associated Press that Syria’s representatives at the U.N. were welcome to attend, though the two sides do not speak to each other.
When he saw the photos from the Caesar exhibit for the first time Friday in his office, Ghadbian said he sobbed.
Speaking ahead of the exhibition, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said: ‘Anyone who has seen the images will never forget them.
‘Maimed bodies, people with their eyes gouged out, emaciated prisoners. It defies anybody’s sense of humanity.’
The exhibition comes as an international rights group announced Wednesday that more than 600 medical workers have been killed in Syria’s civil war.
Physicians for Human Rights said it has documented 233 attacks on 183 medical facilities across Syria since the country’s conflict began in March 2011.
In a report, it said that President Bashar Assad’s government is responsible for 88 per cent of the recorded attacks on hospitals and 97 percent of the killings of medical workers.
It documented 139 deaths directly attributable to torture and execution.The group’s director of investigations Erin Gallagher said, “every doctor killed or hospital destroyed leaves hundreds or even thousands of Syrians with nowhere to turn for health care.”
