Witness from Amnesty International

My Heart Is Burnt

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Episode notes

Amnesty’s Donatella Rovera has an extraordinary job – she walks the bombed-out streets of the Syrian city of Raqqa, talking to witnesses and searching the rubble. Her aim? To piece together evidence of the lives lost during its bombardment by the US-led coalition in 2017. Case by case, she collects tiny scraps of information, hoping to get justice for the bereaved. In this episode, she describes the day-to-day difficulties and occasional victories that come with working in a place described as ‘the most destroyed city in modern times’.  

“I go to places during the acute phase… in the middle of conflict… just after the conflict… places that are difficult to get to. Places where other people don’t want to go.”