How Russia makes war: Syrian memories

BBC Arabic: perspectives on the war in Ukraine from across the Middle East and North Africa.

Dima Babilie of BBC Arabic is from Damascus in Syria. She compares the Russian invasion of Ukraine with the Russian intervention in the Syrian conflict, and tells us about the pro-Assad Syrians who want to fight alongside the Russian forces.

Hanan Razek tells us about her investigation into Russia's recruitment of mercenaries. She spoke to a serving fighter with the secretive Wagner organisation who says he was in Kharkiv at the beginning of the invasion. She also found some recruitment ads on social media inviting mercenaries to a "picnic in Ukraine".

Mehdi Musawi works on the BBC Arabic TV and radio phone-in programme Talking Point. Its focus has been entirely on the war since the Russian invasion, and Mehdi tells us about some of the topics they have covered, and which have attracted the greatest response.

Murad Shishani was deployed to the Polish-Ukrainian border at the start of the war and interviewed Arabic-speaking refugees, many of whom had already fled war in their home countries. Murad is a Jordanian of Chechen origin, and he explained the negative reactions this sometimes provokes, on this and previous assignments.

(Photo: Composite image of destruction in Aleppo, Syria in 2017 (L) and the aftermath of shelling in Kyiv, Ukraine in March 2022. Credit: Joseph Eid/AFP via Getty Images (L), Pavlo Bahmut/Ukrinform/NurPhoto via Getty Images)