By Nicolas Cheviron
Agence France-Presse
ANTAKYA – The last thing Selim remembers from a security crackdown in his Syrian hometown are the two sniper shots that pierced his body. A day later, he woke up in a Turkish hospital across the border.
The 28-year-old worker was among several dozen wounded Syrians who managed to flee mounting bloodshed in their country, crossing through unguarded stretches of the border, and are now in the care of Turkish doctors.
Speaking in his hospital bed, Selim recounted how he was caught up Sunday in a brutal crackdown on the northwest town of Jisr Al Shughour, which has claimed 35 lives, according to Syrian rights activists. The authorities say “armed gangs” killed 120 policemen there.
“The last thing I remember is the shots of a sniper: A bullet came through my collarbone and exited through my left flank. As I tried to warn my friends, another bullet pierced my hand. Then I lost consciousness,” he told AFP.
He woke up Monday in a hospital in Antakya, a Turkish town some 50 kilometres from the border. How he ended up there – he has no idea.
Fellow Syrians are believed to have taken the young man to the frontier, where he was picked by an ambulance.
Mohammed, a 31-year-old housepainter, was also among Sunday’s casualties in Jisr Al Shughur.
“I was shot by plainclothes police. A bullet pierced my right hand and I cannot move three fingers now,” he said, pointing at a large bandage around his hand.
“An hour later I was at the Turkish border. I was dropped there in a car. I passed through the barbed wire and then a Turkish ambulance took me to hospital,” he said.
Mohammed – not his real name – speaks of indiscriminate violence against civilians in his town, including fire from helicopter gunships.
“We were burying our dead on Saturday. The security forces began to fire at the end of the burial. We were shot at from the central post office building, we were shot at from everywhere,” he said.