I am the proud son of Dr Zackaria Ahmed Hankir and would like to take the opportunity to say a few words on this peculiar matter. Whilst my dad might have been quoted for saying that he used the Doshka as a “decoration item” what he meant was that he is in the habit of collecting all sorts of items which he uses to furnish his private home and clinic. That particular item is something he simply acquired over decades of collecting various bits and bobs (believe me, I used to go to the Sunday Markets in the UK with him as far back as 20 years ago when I was 10 years of age). The army confiscated this item among many others which as Sergio rightfully said don’t even shoot. Further, they subjected my further to the ignominy of being detained in jail. Now I may have a relatively liberal sense of what constitutes human rights having lived in the UK for a vast majority of my life, but a man is fully entitled to collect whatever his heart desires so long as it is not to the harm of others. My father is an exceptional physician who as Sam (bless your soul sir) rightly said, doesn’t charge a majority of his patients for his services. I can attest to this because despite the fact my father is a Dr, I (and the rest of my family) have had to work for everything we have just so that the people of Saida and other cities in Lebanon could benefit from his altruistic services. I can’t give you a figure (likely in the hundreds if not the thousands), but it is a matter of fact that there are a plethora of people out there in this world (the UK and Ireland included) who are alive and well thanks to my father’s ingenuity and compassion as a physician. He is an asset to Lebanon in the truest sense of the term and nothing less than a devoted patriot. The man has a British passport and me and my 3 brothers are all based in the UK. He can easily return here if he had the desire but he simply does n’t. Finally my father has dealt with this matter with dignity and transparency and so I hope other more pressing matters can be addressed by the authorities of Lebanon; a nation that I will always be inextricably connected to and also deeply proud of.

Dr Mohammed Zackaria Hankir, Oxford UK.