IMPARTIAL OBSERVERS?

So the Arab League team have begun their task in Syria. In the group is General Mustafa
al-Dabi – a man who has been accused of human rights abuses in the Sudan, a country that does not have a good reputation on human rights itself. Al-Dabi is reported to have said he saw nothing frightening on his visit to Homs – maybe he should take a look at photos taken by Mani, (a pseudonym), a French photojournalist. Having heard an interview with him on BBC Radio 4 programme, PM, it is obvious Mani's work has affected him greatly.
Opposition members in Syria have complained it is impossible to speak to any league members without the authorities knowing. One wonders how balanced the Arab League's representatives will be in their report; after all this is a political game with a fellow member of the Arab League, and doing the right thing politically is, I believe, far more important than concerns about individual groups of citizens.
Meanwhile the UN stands by, as did the crowds at games in the Colosseum in Rome. How many more people need to die before action is taken? Obviously détente is more important than human lives. The reports of torture and killing, even of patients in hospitals, beggars belief.
I worked with a Syrian in Saudi Arabia, and we would meet for coffee in my flat because he was afraid to speak to me outside in case a Syrian government agent was listening, (he feared for the safety of his family should he be heard to make an adverse comment about Bashar Al-Assad or his secret service).
I guess many people are immune to violence and human rights abuses outside their own sphere of experience. How do you arouse them? Empower them to act in what ever way they can? I have no answer to this. All I can do is keep writing and hope someone is spurred in to action as a result. I keep hoping.