A diplomat I was!

“I was sure that the regime was killing people under the pretext that they were terrorists… I didn’t want to be part of the crimes committed against the Syrian people,” says Khalid, a defected Syrian diplomat with a 14-year-long career behind him.

Khalid is now on the Syrian regime’s wanted list, he says, accused of high-grade terrorism - a crime punishable by execution.

Khalid has a brother in Sweden, but his other two siblings and parents are still in Deir ez-Zor. “They are living under a huge security threat,” says Khalid.

“The challenge for me now is that I have to forget that I was a diplomat...The only jobs available for me here are in cafés or restaurants... 

Before, I hoped that one day I would return to my old job once the regime is gone and I would do something for my country and my people, but now every day something depressing happens, something that makes every Syrian everywhere in this world feel that the space for hope is narrowing.”