SYRIA – Homs may be the clearest evidence of the destruction that the Syrian civil war has wrought upon the country. The city, which is about 100 miles north of the capital, Damascus, was once the country’s third-largest, with a population of more than 600,000. However, after Homs became a rebel stronghold in 2011, it was hit by a military assault by government forces. The ensuing battle nearly destroyed Homs and left it a husk of a city.

Despite the destruction, ordinary life goes on — to an extent, at least. On 5 February, newlyweds Nada Merhi, 18, and Hassan Youssef, 27, took their wedding photos amid the ruins of the city. Joseph Eid, a photographer with Agence France-Presse, accompanied the couple and their wedding photographer, Jafar Meray, on the shoot — Eid said Meray told him he wanted “to show that life is stronger than death.”(INDEPENDENT UK)…[+]