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Marie Colvin’s last BBC interview: Full transcript

Yesterday, veteran Sunday Times journalist Marie Colvin gave a telephone interview to the BBC describing the ‘sickening’Syrian army bombardment of Baba Amr.

Today it was confirmed that Colvin was one of two journalists killed by a Syrian army shell.

Here is what may well be her last report:

‘It’s absolutely sickening. Just today, shelling started at 6.30 in the morning and I counted 14 shells hitting this civilian area Baba Amr within 30 seconds.

‘There is a small clinic, you can’t really call it a clinic. It’s an apartment that has been turned into a clinic. Plasma bags and coathangers. There was a constant stream of civilians. I watched a little baby die today. Absolutely horrific.

‘There was a two year old, they stripped it and found the shrapnel had gone into the left chest and the doctor just said ‘I can’t do anything’ and his little tummy just kept heaving until he died.

‘That is happening over and over and over. No-one here can understand how the international community can let this happen.

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‘Particularly when you have an example of Srebrenica – shelling of a city, lots of investigations by the United Nations after that massacre, lots of vows to never let it happen again – for 28,000 people in Baba Amr in Homs where I am besieged they are here because they can’t get out.

‘The Syrians will not let them out and are shelling all the civilian areas. Obviously there is the free Syrian army. There very, very lightly armed. Kalashnikovs and I’ve seen a few RPGs. They’re essentially playing a defensive role and in fact people are terrified they will leave. There is just shells, rockets and tank fire spouting into civilian areas of this city. It is just unrelenting.”

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