A Manhunt for Assad’s Shabihas Mahmoud Al-Ken | Producer, Al Jazeera News Channel Fidelius Schmid | Der Spiegel, Film Co-Producer
It was that night in Tunisia when I met Eyad, a senior producer in Al Jazeera’s programmes department, for the first time. As we ate dinner, Eyad looked at me and smiled. “Mahmoud, I have seen your previous documentaries, they have wonderful content, but you need support in image and direction,” he said. I told him I couldn’t agree more and that I would appreciate his help as he was the expert. However, I continued, if we want to do this right, we will have to follow a different approach: setting criteria for filtering cases and conducting proper research before beginning the filming process. Eyad agreed
and told me that he would support such an unusual approach within the department. The criteria were clear: we would have to find stories with evidence that was strong enough to meet the prosecutors’ benchmark for opening a case. I got in touch with Qoutaiba, a Syrian human rights activist. We had a look at the database he had spent years compiling and shortlisted more than 90 names. But none of them met the criteria. I tried contacting witnesses. However, many of them feared for their lives or for the lives of their relatives in Syria.
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