Ali Ferzat, a cartoonist who has been critical of the Syrian government, was forced from his car and brutally beaten.  According to the UN more than  2,200 have been killed in protesting the government since mid-March.  They are demanding the removal of President Bashar al-Assad whose family has been in power for 40 years.

One of Ali Ferzat’s latest cartoons shows President Assad sweatily clutching a suitcase while he tries to hitch a lift with the Libyan leader, Col Muammar Gaddafi, who is furiously driving a getaway car.

Activists in Syria say Ferzat was forcibly removed from his car in Damascus, beaten and dumped at the side of a road.

The BBC has more on the situation in Syria.