Kristyan Benedict

Mansour Omari, a Syrian human rights defender, gives a personal account of the first day of a historic Syrian torture trial in Koblenz, Germany.

Part 2 of Mansour Omari's deeply personal account of the Syria torture trial in Koblenz, Germany.

I wondered what his victims felt hearing his voice. Was it too penetrating? Did it throw them back to that time and place when they heard it for the first time?

Kristyan Benedict - @KreaseChan “Make sure my phone is always charged in case Islam calls me” - that’s what Ahmad Helmi told his mother when she visited him in prison. Islam Dabbas was Ahmad’s best friend. His companion from boyhood...

A handful of Syrian activists, despite unimaginable personal trauma, are fighting for justice for Syria. Because without justice there can never be peace.

Syrian journalist Marwan Hisham speaks poignantly of his return to Raqqa after a 4-year absence, as any hope for normality quickly fades in a part of the world braced for yet more conflict and catastrophe.

By Kristyan Benedict - AIUKs Crisis & Tactical Campaigns Manager. Twitter - KreaseChan “What is a laptop?” The man I was sitting with just off Taksim Square in Istanbul asked this apparently bizarre question after experiencing his new...

Several governments have begun military action against Syria. Whatever happens, they must protect civilian life.

Kristyan Benedict - @KreaseChan I’m in Beirut and my second workshop with the Syrian human right initiative Ta’afi has just wrapped up. As I’m collecting my papers, Ahmad, the head of Ta’afi, which works to resettle and empower newly...

The situation in eastern Ghouta is by no means a recent crisis. Syrians have now endured seven years of horrifying violence.

It’s too early to say exactly what Donald Trump’s presidential victory means for Syria’s beleaguered civilians. Will he “pivot” the USA towards Assad and Putin in some narrow “counter terror” strategy against ISIS? He has certainly...

By Kristyan Benedict - @KreaseChan As London plays host to Syria’s political opposition, talk once again is about a future political “transition” in Syria. Given the relentlessly brutal reality on the ground in Syria, any search for a...

Kristyan Benedict - @KreaseChan It’s 9am, and in a small corner of a hotel in Gaziantep, southern Turkey, a group of Syrian activists are huddled together discussing their work in the war-torn city of Aleppo. This is not an uncommon...

Kristyan Benedict - @KreaseChan “Syria was once known as the ‘Kingdom of silence’. In 2011 it burst into speech – not in one voice but in millions…For a few brief moments the people changed everything. Then the counter-revolutions...

Kristyan Benedict - on Twitter as @KreaseChan Civilians in Syria are being subjected to appalling human rights violations committed by the Syrian government and many armed opposition groups. These violations amount to war crimes and in...

By Kristyan Benedict - Amnesty International UK @KreaseChan On October 6 I spoke on a panel at the Frontline Club about the horrific Caesar photos and the ongoing search for justice and accountability in Syria. Below is a summary...

by Kristyan Benedict, Amnesty International UK - @KreaseChan Douma, like many besieged and bombed parts of Syria, has slipped out of the mainstream news again. The humanitarian catastrophe there is still very much a reality though and...

“For to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.”  — Nelson Mandela Freedom from fear doesn’t come easy. That’s especially the case in Syria. For over four...

One year ago today Russia and China vetoed a UN Security Council resolution which would have referred the horrendous situation in Syria to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court. That callous move compounded the misery for...