Assad's cousin: The regime has killed more than 500,000 Syrians 

Firas Al-Assad, cousin of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, attacked his family on Facebook, accusing them of killing more than 100,000 Alawites and more than half a million Syrians in order to stay in power.

“Sympathising with tens of thousands of poor, dead Syrian youth who have found themselves fighting in the regime’s army to protect it is not my fault. The regime could have avoided all this with some modesty toward its people,” Firas said in a letter addressing his pro-regime brother Duraid.

“You killed 100,000 Alawites to stay in power …” and “You allowed [Russian Foreign Minister Sergey] Lavrov and [Iranian Major General Qasem] Soleimani to issue orders and take decisions.”

“Do you think your uncle would let Lavrov and Soleimani issue orders and take decisions on Syrian territory affecting its people?  I swear he would have hanged [Bashar’s cousin and the head of the secret police in Daraa] Atef Najib and [Bashar’s cousin] Rami Makhlouf in the squares of Daraa and Damascus, in an attempt to satisfy the Syrian people and avoid the collapse of the country,” Firas added.

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“Why wouldn’t you and your brothers fight? If you, son of the leader, are asking people to sacrifice their lives for you, then you will have to engage your sons first. You, sons of a doctor, being killers and slaughterers destroying your country, crushing your people, killing hundreds of thousands and subjecting your country to foreign occupation for a chair, is not my fault.”

“I will always remember the blood of 100,000 poor Alawite people, or even more, killed in order to allow you to preserve your thrones. I won’t forget the half million poor Syrians, or more killed, because you convinced them that your corruption, tyranny and prison were destined. I won’t forget the limbs and bodies of the Syrian children ripped by your barrel bombs and indiscriminate bombardment and buried them under the rubble of their own homes. I won’t be silent,” he concluded.