Al-Sayed, a videographer, died at a local hospital soon
after being wounded while covering Syrian forces’ bombardment of the city of
Homs, news
reports said. The central city was under the 18th consecutive day of
intense shelling by forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad.
Al-Sayed was a videographer whose work appeared on a
live-streaming site and was picked up by international and regional news
organizations. He had transmitted videos of events in the Homs neighborhood of
Baba Amr to the live-streaming site Bambuser, and had uploaded hundreds of
videos to his YouTube
channel. His footage was used by several news organizations, news reports
said.
By controlling local news reports and expelling or denying
entry to dozens of international journalists, the Syrian government had sought
to impose a blackout on independent news coverage after the country’s uprising
began in early 2011. In the face of this attempted news blackout, international
media relied heavily on footage shot by citizen journalists such as al-Sayed.
Al-Sayed was the cousin of Basil al-Sayed, a
videographer killed while working in Baba Amr in December.