Two French journalists evacuated from Syria’s battered city Homs arrived yesterday at a military airport near Paris after escaping the besieged protest hub where two of their colleagues were killed.
A plane transporting wounded reporter Edith Bouvier, 31, and photographer William Daniels, 34, flew in from Beirut, arriving at Villacoublay airport where they were met by relatives and French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
Mr Sarkozy, who announced yesterday that Paris would close its embassy in Syria to denounce President Bashar al-Assad’s “scandalous” repression, paid homage to the journalists on their arrival. He said that Syrian authorities will “be called to account for their crimes before international criminal jurisdictions.”
Mr Sarkozy said, also praising a “chivalrous” Daniels for staying with Ms Bouvier in the Homs suburb of Baba Amr during days of heavy regime bombardment. Mr Daniels praised the people of Homs, saying: “All of Baba Amr supported us. They treated us like kings. We were in one of the most protected houses. These people are heroes who are being massacred.”
His eyes welling up with tears, Mr Daniels added: “Those who saved our lives are surely dead, although I don’t know. ... It was nine days of non-stop nightmare...”
An ambulance parked on the tarmac took Ms Bouvier to a military hospital for treatment for a broken leg suffered during the deadly bombardment of an improvised media centre in Homs on February 22. The rocket attack in Baba Amr killed French photographer Remi Ochlik as well as veteran Sunday Times reporter Marie Colvin, and wounded Ms Bouvier and British photographer Paul Conroy. Paris prosecutors yesterday opened a murder probe into the attack as the International Committee of the Red Cross said they were taking the bodies of Mr Ochlik and Ms Colvin to Damascus after they were exhumed by Syrian forces.
Syrian authorities have been accused of deliberately targeting journalists during the uprising against Mr Assad’s regime. Meanwhile the Red Cross said yesterday that Syria had blocked an aid convoy from entering the vanquished rebel stronghold of Baba Amr, amid reports of brutal reprisals there by government forces.