War Crimes & Transitional Justice in Syria / By Maram Daoud

MESOP – 22-3-2014 – International Human Rights organizations such as HRW have published many reports of human rights violations in Syria, which talk about war crimes that have certainly happened. These reports are talking about not only violations on Syrian people such as arresting, starving, and massacres, but also completely destroying of neighborhoods and using of explosive barrels.So, We’re facing a complicated catastrophe that should be resolved by democratic transition, releasing the detainees, passing the aids to the sieged areas then judging the killers, rebuilding the destroyed neighborhoods and moral and material compensation of harmed people, that all mean transitional justice.

Transitional justice refers to the set of judicial and non-judicial measures that have been implemented by different countries in order to redress the legacies of massive human rights abuses. These measures include criminal prosecutions, fact finding committees, reparations programs, and various kinds of institutional reforms. “The International Center for Transitional Justice ICTJ”

Returning to these reports and the political resolving ways should have been discussed in Geneva negotiations which should come to put Geneva communiqué into practical steps for achieving the humanitarian needs, the urgent thing ever, then the democratic transition and the move of the power, And issuing a law of terrorism of the foreigners in Syria from the Security Council towards the transitional justice. These reports, they have to lead not only the Syrian regime to ICC, but also the leaders of security branches especially Bashar Al-Assad himself since he is the General Commander of the Armed Forces, In addition to the leaders of security branches. The war crimes in Syria have happened by militias and Salafi jihadist groups too such as ISIS and Al-Nusra, where the International Human Rights organizations have documented a lot of violations, massacres and kidnapping of Syrian People. These violations added to regime’s increase the complexity of the Syrian case, especially because the media concentrate that it’s the opposition’s violations and that let a part of Syrian people looking at the Syrian regimeas a defender from the terrorists. The most important thing to know is that the Syrian government signed the Rome agreement in 1999 but that doesn’t mean Syria became a member of ICC, so the ICC cannot follow the war crimes in Syria. Which means all the calls to judge the regime, are political bidding only.

There’s another way to judge the Syrian regime when the Security Council calls it by a decision from the Security Council itself to ICC just as happened with the Al-Bashir, The Sudanese president. The problem here is that the political alliances of the regime would not allow the Security Council to judge the regime. Especially, the most likely form of transitional governing body could be when Al-Assad would stay the presidentof Syria during the transitional period. And if Al-Assad would resign from the presidency, it’s a victory to an opposition in Geneva which has no power on armed forces or documented lists of detainees. How could we talk about transitional justice in Syria to achieve the rights of harmed people without judging the Syrian regime? And what the Syrian sample of transitional justice could be! The destroyed buildings and the completely destroying of neighborhoods where there’s no life at all even for cats and dogs, and the thousands of thousands of victims that their parents are feelings of grudge and even the revenge will not cure them, the detainees who have gotten a psychologicalproblems after months of torture, starving and humiliation, and also depriving the people of foods and services in the sieged ariascouldn’t be passed without judging each one who is responsible of this crazy suffering,even though the regime’s allies would never allow the Security Council to call the regime for judging.How could we ask victim’s families to forget about the punishment of the responsible of explosive barrels? Could we imagine the amount of the miserable crime of these barrels!! And the injuries of them? And also for the people who support the regime would not allow the power to move to another one, they suffered also of the massacres, displacement and starving from the siege of the militias, how could they accept the power to leave, so their future will move with it. How could the revenge they feel from each one on the opposition side be cured? And for the pro-militias and the leaders of security, they will also be comfortable of the move of the power or will be waited for the judgment normally? It’s normal that the armed conflicts will be replaced by explosions and assassinations. It’s clear that there’s discrepancy between the nearest political solution and the working on the transitional justice.

After these functions surrounding the Syrian crisis, we could say it’s better to let the political process goes on and looking for an opposition acceptable of most of the Syrian people to lead the transitional period holding the future of the Al-Assad until the transitional period have passed with the lowest risks. Then, the transitional justice would be worked on after conciliation all over Syria among the peopledepending on investigation committees and clearing by the national media all the violations that happened. – http://syrianncb.org/2014/03/21/war-crimes-and-transitional-justice-in-syria/