(8 Jan 2021) LEAD IN:
When Syrian Aziz al-Asmar watched the chaos unraveling in the U.S. Capitol, he immediately thought of the conflict in his country.
The perceived similarities between the violence in Washington, D.C. and the war in his country became the subject of his latest mural.
STORY-LINE:
The storming of the U.S. Capitol by a mob of President Donald Trump's supporters has inspired the latest work of Syrian artist Aziz al-Asmar.
While the rampage has shocked the world, it left al-Asmar reflecting on the situation in his country.
"This immediately brought to my mind the recent memory of Bashar Assad's thugs destroying villages and stealing the furniture from the houses," he says.
In the small town of Binnish in northern Syria's Idlib province, the artist is working on a mural that draws parallels between the chaos in the U.S. Capitol and the violence in Syria.
It shows the emblem of Congress but instead of the head of the eagle, he drew Trump's face.
In his mural, the eagle is holding bombs and rockets, as a symbol of the way "dictators always refuse defeat in elections."
"They refuse to hand over power, even if that means the destruction of their country," he adds.
Syria's nine-year war has killed perhaps half a million people, wounded more than a million and forced about 5.6 million to flee abroad as refugees, mostly to neighbouring countries.
Another 6 million of Syria's prewar population of 23 million have been internally displaced by the fighting.
The artist chose to paint his mural on the wall of a building destroyed by Syrian and Russian airstrikes.
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