Syrian refugee artist uses Pokemon Go to illustrate tragedy of lives ripped apart by war

A Syrian graphic designer has created a series of images based on the hugely popular mobile game, Pokémon Go, to highlight the plight of people in war-torn Syria.

Saif Aldeen Tahhan, now living in Denmark, created the images showing phones held up against backdrops of ravaged Syrian cities and items needed by citizens in the country instead of Pokémon.

Where in the Pokémon game animated creatures appear on your phone to be captured, in the Syria Go images, a phone held up to a bombed out street shows a medical kit.

One image shows a defence shield while in the backdrop a huge explosion rises. In another, an abandoned school building shows a pile of books - the education children are missing. For lost childhoods, a brand new teddy bear appears amongst ripped and burned toys. And for those desperately fleeing the war, a lifebuoy to cling to as they cross the sea.

Tahhan told IBTimes UK that he had created the images to try and turn attention towards the Syrian cause, hoping to turn the focus "on Syrian suffering instead of Pokémon".

He said that his original posting of the images has received thousands of likes and shares. "I hope they will react very soon in the real life," said Tahhan.

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Now living in Aalborg in Denmark, Tahhan spent his whole life in Damascus until he decided to leave at the end of 2011 as the conflict began to escalate. He lived in Saudi Arabia for two years before moving to Egypt, and then finally arriving in Denmark in September, 2014, where he has lived and worked since.

The comments on his original posting of the images, where Tahhan described the images as a 'Syrian version' of Pokémon Go, shows the widespread reaction that Tahhan has managed to garner - with one user in Sweden saying, "I'm actually a gamer, but this work is really good & this deserves attention for real."

As for the game itself that has been taking over the lives of people around the world, Tahhan says he downloaded it but "I'm not so interested".