Fares Shehabi shared his post with these words: “Years ago, we did everything we could after the liberation of the city to recover production.. Today we stand in front of the major challenges of securing electricity, diesel and violins.. and bringing life back to export.. and overcoming unjust western sanctions.. we need To greater government understanding and faster resilience.. to an active international airport.. to a serious fight against smuggling and corruption and to remove all the restrictions we put on ourselves.”
**I’d like to add my own words, about the re-opening of this factory when they did, in the face of terrorists less than 500 metres away. This video I recorded in January 2019 includes Fares explaining the terrorism the factory owners and workers faced, defiantly and courageously deciding to fix and re-open their factory.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2uyKdrpBLc
Fares noted: “This factory is on a front line in the war against terror. 400 to 500 metres away, the Tajik Brigades of the Islamic Turkistan Army, a branch of al-Qaeda in Syria. This factory was rubble two years ago. We rehabilitated it. We are doing this as a message of defiance against all who conspired against the people of Aleppo, against the economy of Syria. The enemy was sniping at us , launching mortars, when we were fixing this factory to work again. Show me one place in the world with a production situation like this, a factory being rehabilitated under these circumstances. This is why they out us under sanctions, this is why they consider us enemies. How can I be an enemy of freedom and democracy if I want our people to work, to make money, my country to have a production economy, and I don’t yield to al-Qaeda gangs in close proximity to me….imagine the difficult situation in which these heroes, the factory workers and owners, had to go through in order to defy al-Nusra and defy Turkey, and rise up again from the ashes. This is a real example of how you rise up, undefeated.”
