Liberation publishes Yazbek’s testimony on Syrian jails, featured earlier in The Guardian. As an introduction, journalist Ayad explains the context of the event.

Two huge men entered the room. They stood in readiness, in plainclothes. One of them stood to the right and the other to the left. With a signal from his eyes, each seized me by the shoulders, though not roughly. They seized me as if I were some object, easy for them to move. I did not resist when they started to lift me out of my chair.

SAMAR YAZBEK 40 years old, blue eyed gentle cosmopolitan. Watching her at first, it is impossible to tell from which part of the world she is. But then it takes little to realize how deeply a daughter of Syria she is. How delighted she is with her language, Arabic, to which she has dedicated her studies, and which has accompanied her work as a feminist and political activist, as a journalist, screenwriter for cinema and TV, and especially a writer. It also takes little to realize that this soft aspect of hers hides an immense courage.

(April 1, 2011) Security patrols swarm through the streets; they are everywhere I go. Cars coming and going; speeding then slowing down. Huge buses of security men wearing helmets and military uniforms are spreading through the markets, squares, major intersections and places where there might be demonstrations. Men in civilian clothes are gathering; their heavy presence exposes them. How did I learn to tell the difference between a security officer and an ordinary man in Damascus? It’s hard to tell when I first started to play this game; when my instincts first outpaced questions and words. I know them from their eyes. From the way their wear their clothes. From their shoes. There are more security men than ordinary people on the streets today, in the alleys, in front of stalls, in the squares, in front of schools. Everywhere I go, the security men are there.

I won’t say that I am calm now. I am truly silent. I listen to the beats of my heart like the echo of a distant explosion that is clearer than the sound of the bullets, than the shouts of the young, than the wailing of mothers. Clearer than the tremor in my mother’s voice when she implores me not to go out onto the street.
By Samar Yazbek

No one dared crossing the threshold of such topics before, but Samar wings her way in with elegance.