Natural History Museum: No drinks for death merchants

My name is Rose. I live in London, but all my family are from Syria. When I was growing up I used to go visit my relatives every summer. They lived in the suburbs of Homs, in villages. Now, most of my family are either dead, injured, missing or refugees, and the place I love has been flattened.

At first, Assad’s thugs attacked people in my area with knives, and with whatever crude tools they could get their hands on. But then something changed: they suddenly had bigger, deadlier weapons. Machinery that could reduce whole villages to rubble, that spared nothing with their fire.

Next week, the Natural History Museum, one of the world’s most cherished institutions, is set to welcome a major supplier of these deadly arms to the Syrian regime.

As arms dealers gather to toast their first day of business at Farnborough International trade show, executives from Russian state arms dealer Rosoboronexport are expected to join the lavish welcome gala at the Natural History Museum. But we can stop this shocking endorsement of a company whose regular shipments are used to slaughter innocent men, women and children.

Let's call on Natural History Museum director Dr Michael Dixon to stand with the people of Syria and bar Rosoboronexport from attending Monday's drinks party there. Sign my urgent petition now -- and once it reaches 20,000 signers we will deliver it with a media splash to the museum boss.