Thousands Flee Eastern Ghouta as War Turns 7
ALLEN: The Syrian civil war reached a grim milestone as residents fled Eastern Ghouta Thursday. State media report more than 10,000 people escaped the area, this as the conflict reached its seventh anniversary. Eastern Ghouta has been hammered for weeks by a Syrian government assault, constant bombings. Both rebels and government forces accuse the other side of using civilians as human shields. The mass exodus from Eastern Ghouta may be one of the largest since the war began. To discuss what has to be done to protect this huge group of people, I'm joined live from Beirut, Lebanon, by Paul Donohoe. He is a senior media officer --</s>ALLEN: -- at the International Rescue Committee. Paul, thanks so much for talking with us. It is difficult to fathom what the civilians of Syria have been through but we have this photograph, which is another painful illustration. This is Ahmad Hamdan, who social media campaign, #IAmStillAlive. He has now been killed in Syria. He was a resident at Eastern Ghouta. The U.N., of course, tried to stop this bombardment. But it has continued and now people are running for their lives. Is that the solution at this point?</s>PAUL DONOHOE, INTERNATIONAL RESCUE COMMITTEE: Well, no, the only solution is that the cease-fire that was agreed by the U.N. Security Council is enacted. The bombardment that we've seen kill over 1,000 people for the past month to stop and for aid convoys to enter so that those who desperately need food and aid get the help they so desperately and urgently require. For those that have decided to flee, it's going to be a very worrying time for them. They're going to face real trepidation about what waits for them on the other side. But they do know that if they stay, that they're likely to only face more death and destruction. And many of these people would have spent the last month sheltering for their lives in basements. And this could be the first time they'd even have the opportunity to venture out of their homes.</s>ALLEN: And who is assuring that they will reach a safe place and be cared for?</s>DONOHOE: So they've been told that they will receive support when they are able to leave Eastern Ghouta. The one thing we would be looking for is for independent observers to now be involved, to make sure that civilians are protected throughout. What I think we do need to consider, the safety of those that remain inside Eastern Ghouta, so the reports are 10,000 to 20,000 have left. But that still leaves nearly 400,000 remaining inside Eastern Ghouta. And for them, the past month has been hell on Earth. People are told the International Rescue Committee that they don't know if they're going to live one minute from the next. And the only thing that's going to keep them safe is for an end to the bombardment.</s>ALLEN: Yes; as we talk, I want to bring up more pictures from the #IAmStillAlive, just to show children, all kinds of people, trying to get out to social media that they are still alive. We don't know if they are. You mentioned the United Nations. They tried and they failed over and over again. Do you have any hope in that area?</s>DONOHOE: Well, we can only hope that the power that can have influence on the sides involved in the war continue to do what they can to have these agreed U.N. cease-fires enacted. What we all see, though, is the reality that the bombs continue, that more than 1,000 died, 4,000 injured in the past month and that people are just in a desperate situation. There were a few aid convoys that managed to enter some of the besieged area over the last week. But they're only reaching a fraction. And so people have been struggling for four years now, living under siege, not getting the food they require and not getting the health care that they desperately need. So there are more than 1,000 who needed urgent medical evacuation. And a number, I mean, 25 hospitals and clinics were hit during the past month, including two supported by International Rescue Committee. And so the number of people who may have died simply because they were unable to get health care because the hospitals had been put out of action, just shows how desperate a situation this is.</s>ALLEN: Is this the final front for the Syrian regime, backed by Russia? Does it end here? And what does the fall of this enclave signify?</s>DONOHOE: Well, there are millions of people who still live in areas that are controlled by the government of Syria. But this is obviously a very dramatic moment. The 40,000 people who've been living under siege in Eastern Ghouta, that's just on the outskirts of Damascus. But there are still millions of people who are living in Idlib and in the south in Daraa. And all these people are in very difficult situations. They find them -- so many of them have been displaced by the war, sometimes many times. And aid agencies have been trying to reach as many as the time and help those who live, many them in informal</s>DONOHOE: -- injured and half the population of Syria fled their homes. What we are seeing, though, in Eastern Ghouta right now is a real change on the dynamic on the ground. And we are fearful in all -- in international aid organizations, we should be fearful right now for the safety of civilians that, in a moment like this, we don't see civilians caught in the crossfire as we see forces advance.</s>ALLEN: Every time there's another atrocity, we think, the world thinks, how can there be any more? And there is another and another and we're seeing that now. We thank you so much, Paul Donahoe, with the International Rescue Committee. Thanks. Well, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad may have unleashed his war machine against his own people seven years on now. But years ago he was a practicing eye doctor in London. Nic Robertson look at how he went from being a family man to ruling over the rubble of his own country.</s>NIC ROBERTSON, CNN  INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR (voice-over): President Bashar al-Assad has all the traits of an old-school dictator. He is responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Syrians. But it's not how he sees himself.</s>BASHAR AL-ASSAD, SYRIAN PRESIDENT: My enemy is terrorism. The instability in Syria. This is our enemy. It's not about people. It's not about persons. The whole -- it's not about me staying or leaving. It's about the country being safe or not.</s>ROBERTSON: To his loyal followers, Assad is a bulwark against a threat of radical Islamist terror. Before the war, many in the West thought he was a bulwark against instability sweeping the region. He trained and practiced as an eye doctor in London. Was thought to be more sophisticated than his brutal father, Hafez, whom he replaced 18 years ago. But it was a sham. When faced with peaceful protest, he called in the tanks. Assad had never expected to lead Syria. His tougher older brother, Bassel, who had been groomed to be president died in a car crash in 1994. Once the civil war got under way, Assad's family, in particular his younger brother, Maher, a feared military commander, stiffened his resolve for a long, bloody fight. Iran and their Lebanese proxies added their punch, backing Assad's forces with weapons and troops. Then, Russia, detecting a lack of Western will, flew to Assad's rescue with massive air power, turning a tide of battlefield losses to strategic gains. While hospitals were crushed and civilians starved and pulverized under their brutal bombing, areas under Assad's control escaped the worst ravages of the war. Compare the center of the capital, Damascus, Assad's official home, with Eastern Ghouta less than 10 miles away. In his rare appearances, Assad, occasionally accompanied by his wife, appears unruffled by the mayhem they are spawning and in even rarer interviews, he sounds as callous as he is blind to the facts under his knows. This, in 2011.</s>ASSAD: The only thing that you could be afraid of as president to lose the support of your people. That's the only thing that you can be afraid of.</s>ROBERTSON: And this, six years, hundreds of thousands of deaths later.</s>ASSAD: The suffering of the Syrian people, the humanitarian interaction between me and every city and my family who died, who only died. This is the only thing that could deprive me from sleep from time to time. But not the Western statements and not the threat of the support of the terrorists.</s>ROBERTSON: Despite unanimous U.N. agreement to transition Assad out of power, peace talks in Geneva are failing to unseat him because he is winning the war. His big backers, Iran and Russia, have too much to lose to let him go. Assad may bridle at the moniker dictator, but no other world leader now in power has so much of his countrymen's blood on his hands -- Nic Robertson, CNN, London.</s>ALLEN: Top diplomats from North and South Korea are preparing for what could be a momentous summit between President Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un. We will have more details straight ahead.