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Justice in Syria

Syrian Colonel Anwar Raslan handcuffed during his trial in Koblenz (Germany)
6 January 2022 by Hannah El-Hitami
Prosecution: "Raslan was either powerless, or he wasn’t" Today on January 6, the defense will make its closing arguments before the court in Koblenz, Germany. The trial against former Syrian secret service colonel Anwar Raslan is coming to an end. In December, the prosecution and joint [...]
Anwar Raslan in the dock in Koblenz (Al-Khatib trial), Germany
5 November 2021 by Hannah El-Hitami
Syrian torture trial in Germany: “Raslan was scared” As the first Syrian state crimes trial in Europe is coming to an end, it is the defence’s turn to show the main defendant, Anwar Raslan, in a different light. They presented a man stripped of real authority, sympathetic to the rev [...]
Destroyed buildings in Homs, Syria
22 July 2021 by Lena Bjurström
In France, the lengthy Syrian investigations Investigations on crimes in Syria are multiplying in France. They now constitute the largest number of cases handled by judicial bodies dedicated to the prosecution of war crimes and crimes against humanity. But the many investiga [...]
Landscape of the region of Deir ez-Zor in Syria
12 July 2021 by Thijs Bouwknegt
Caught killing on camera in Deir ez-Zor On July 2, Dutch prosecutors demanded a 27-year prison sentence for Ahmad Al Khedr for a single war crime and participation in a terrorist group in Deir ez-Zor, Syria. At the heart of the case is the execution of a Syrian officer, [...]
The hands of a Syrian doctor with blood on his scrubs
8 July 2021 by Hannah El-Hitami
Syrian trial in Germany: the role of doctors and hospitals in the Assad regime’s prison system In the Al-Khatib trial in Koblenz, Germany, a doctor testified about treating prisoners in the Syrian Secret Service’s Branch 251. He reported severe injuries, and deaths on an almost daily basis. But while he was tasked with impr [...]
Demonstration in Damas, Syria
29 April 2021 by Hannah El-Hitami
At the Syrian trial in Germany, personal encounters with Colonel Raslan In Germany, the first trial on crimes by the Syrian regime has entered its second year. After establishing the structural context in which the crimes were committed, the court is now focusing on the individual role of the accused [...]
Justice applied in the Netherlands on crimes committed in Syria
23 April 2021 by Janet H. Anderson
Syria, the Dutch international crimes unit new focus On 21 April the first Syrian asylum seeker was convicted in The Netherlands of war crimes. Are investigations into Syria now bearing fruit, or are the Dutch authorities still dealing with atrocities in the Syrian conflict piecemea [...]
Military parade in the presence of Bashar al-Assad
9 April 2021 by Lena Bjurström
Austria: High-potential investigations on Syria crimes Austria, a pioneer of extraterritorial jurisdiction that tried a Bosnian for genocide as early as 1994, still does not have an investigation unit dedicated to international crimes. However, it is investigating at least two major S [...]
Sedra Alshehabi stands with a placard with the picture of her father Ali and a text reading 'First step but my father and 130000 are still in jail' after the verdict in the trail of Syrian defendant Eyad al-Gharib
1 March 2021 by Hannah El-Hitami
Germany: Lessons from the first conviction of an agent of the Syrian regime On February 24 Eyad al-Gharib was the first Syrian regime official to be convicted by a German court for aiding and abetting the torture and detention of protesters in 2011. The minor role the defendant played in those crimes is m [...]
Syrian civilian riding his bike through the street near the remains of a car bomb explosion
11 February 2021 by Lena Bjurström
Sweden on the frontline with Syria cases From the first war crimes trial to the first conviction of a government soldier, Sweden has been a pioneer in Europe in the prosecution of crimes committed in Syria. Today, the Swedish Public Prosecutor's Office remains a leader, [...]
5 February 2021 by Hannah El-Hitami
Syrian and Yazidi trials: why victims’ lawyers want sexual violence considered Two landmark trials in Germany have been dealing with crimes against humanity and genocide allegedly committed in Syria and Iraq. So far, they have not focused on sexual and gender-based violence. Civil party lawyers in both Koble [...]
14 December 2020 by Asymmetrical Haircuts
Why the Koblenz trial is an exception? In the field of universal jurisdiction, successes are rare and deserve to be closely watched, as Justice Info does in a first video of its brand new series IN CAMERA, released today - for the Koblenz trial, the first criminal tria [...]
14 December 2020 by Bronwen Cowley
Koblenz, the first Syrian state crimes trial in Europe IN CAMERA | Episode 1 Koblenz, central Germany. This is the first state torture trial for Syria. This is also the first episode of Justice Info’s new IN CAMERA series. Every month, we’ll be bringing you a short video to tell the g [...]
26 November 2020 by Hannah El-Hitami
Syrian trial in Germany: The orders that came from the very top In the Al-Khatib trial against two former secret service officers from Syria, a witness has provided confidential documents issued by the Syrian regime. They would prove that crimes were ordered from the highest government level – [...]
12 November 2020 by Hannah El-Hitami
Syrian torture trial: the “Caesar” files in court for the first time Last week in Koblenz, the renowned “Caesar” files were used as evidence in a court of law, for the first time. A forensic expert testified in the Al-Khatib trial, after having analysed the dead bodies in more than 50,000 photos. H [...]
29 September 2020 by Lena Bjurström
Syrian trials in Europe: “They give a distorted perception of the crimes perpetrated” JUSTICEINFO.NET IN-DEPTH INTERVIEWS Uğur Üngör Professor at the NIOD Institute for war, holocaust and genocide studies in Amsterdam. Almost a decade after the revolution and the beginning of the civil war in Syria, several countri [...]
15 September 2020 by Hannah El-Hitami
Syria: a spotlight on a bureaucracy of mass killings A Syrian government employee has testified anonymously, last week in the Al-Khatib trial in Koblenz (Germany), where two former secret service officers stand accused of crimes against humanity. He described vast mass graves, and d [...]
1 September 2020 by Hannah El-Hitami
The man who brought Raslan to Germany In the Koblenz trial on Syrian state torture, the former secret service officer Anwar Raslan is accused of crimes against humanity. In 2014, he had arrived in Germany with the help of Riad Seif, one of Syria’s most prominent oppos [...]
27 July 2020 by Hannah El-Hitami
Syrian torture trial in Germany: Insiders without protection In the Koblenz trial on Syrian state torture, the first insider witnesses have appeared before the German judges. Two former secret service civil servants had given incriminating testimonies to the police, but in court they were m [...]