In a destroyed building in Syria's Aleppo, neighbors Abu Ahmed and Mohammed Ibrahim desperately rummaged through rubble and debris in search of scraps of plastic to turn into fuel.
Residents of the rebel-held eastern districts of the city have struggled to keep their cars running or their electricity on since government forces first besieged their neighborhoods this summer.
"There's no more fuel on the market, no heating oil, no petrol, no gas," said Abu Ahmed, 40.
"So we've decided to turn to alternatives," he added, with plastic as the raw material in a dangerous and primitive process of extracting fuel to fire up electricity generators.
Fierce clashes south of Aleppo this summer damaged the only power plant that served eastern parts of the city, leaving 250,000 residents without electricity since July. READ MORE
