Felicity Arbuthnot: Amnesty International or War Propaganda?

Amnesty International has released satellite pictures of craters in Syria, citing an increased use of heavy weapons, including near residential areas. The BBC reports, quoting Amnesty: Images from "Anadan" revealed more than 600 probable artillery impact craters from heavy fighting between Syrian armed forces and armed opposition groups. Further: "Turning Syria's most populous city into a battlefield will have devastating consequences for civilians. The atrocities in Syria are mounting already," warned Christoph Koettl, emergency response manager for Amnesty International USA, without acknowledging that the killings of civilians are committed by the US NATO Free Syrian Army (FSA) rather than the government. The Syrian military and the opposition fighters must both adhere to international humanitarian law, which strictly forbids the use of tactics and weapons that fail to distinguish between military and civilian targets. Amnesty's record on impartiality suffered a fatal blow, when they stated in 1991 that Iraqi soldiers had torn babies from their incubators in Kuweit, and left them to die on the hospital's "neo-natal" unit. Arguably this sealed the 1991 onslaught on Iraq. The story that the Kuwaiti government rewarded Amnesty with $500,000 for endorsing this pack of lies has not gone away, and as far as I am aware, to date, has not been denied. Amnesty's record suffered a further blow, when it organized a demonstration last year, outside the London Syrian Embassy, with CAABU- Council for Arab British Understanding, calling for the overthrow of the sovereign Syrian government. A plan which was outlined by the US Embassy in Damascus in December 2005. This action arguably falls under the definition of incitement to terrorism, set out by the UN Security Council on 4th May 2012.