International Courant
Three officers are being tried in absentia over the deaths of two French-Syrian males arrested in Damascus in 2013.
France has opened its first trial in opposition to officers of President Bashar al-Assad’s Syrian authorities, with three prime safety officers tried in absentia for complicity in crimes in opposition to humanity and struggle crimes.
The Paris Prison Court docket on Tuesday heard instances in opposition to the officers for his or her alleged function within the deaths of two French-Syrian males, Mazzen Dabbagh and his son Patrick, who had been arrested within the Syrian capital Damascus in 2013.
Ali Mamlouk, former head of the Syrian Nationwide Safety Company, Jamil Hassan, former director of air pressure intelligence, and Abdel Salam Mahmoud, former head of the company’s investigations in Damascus, are topic to worldwide arrest warrants and shall be tried in absentia . .
“For the primary time, French courts will deal with the crimes dedicated by the Syrian authorities and take a look at the highest-ranking members of the authorities ever prosecuted because the outbreak of the Syrian revolution in March 2011,” the Worldwide Federation for Human Rights mentioned. human rights). FIDH).
Al-Assad’s authorities has been in battle with armed opposition teams after violently suppressing protests in 2011 calling for democratic reforms and the discharge of political prisoners.
Greater than half 1,000,000 individuals have been killed within the struggle, which has displaced thousands and thousands and devastated Syria’s financial system and infrastructure.
Trials in opposition to abuses in Syria have taken place elsewhere in Europe. In these instances, the persecuted had a decrease rank and had been current on the hearings.
Final January, a German courtroom sentenced Anwar Raslan, a former Syrian colonel, to life in jail for crimes in opposition to humanity.
The trial in France is the results of a seven-year investigation carried out by a French judicial struggle crimes unit.
Lawyer Clemence Bectarte, who represents the Dabbagh household and the FIDH, praised “the fruits of an extended authorized battle” earlier than the listening to.
#Dabbaghcase: The historic trial of three senior Syrian intelligence officers begins in the present day at midday #Paris Prison Court docket.
They’re accused of complicity in crimes in opposition to humanity and struggle crimes in reference to the disappearance of two French-Syrians in Bashar… pic.twitter.com/XfWXSkyfcH
— FIDH (@fidh_nl) Could 21, 2024
System of torture
On the time of his arrest, Patrick Dabbagh was a 20-year-old arts and humanities scholar at Damascus College.
His father, Mazzen, was a senior instructional advisor on the French faculty in Damascus.
The 2 had been arrested in November 2013 by males claiming to belong to the Syrian Air Drive intelligence service.
“Witness statements affirm that Mazzen and Patrick had been each taken to a detention heart on the Mezzeh navy airport, which is operated by the Syrian Air Drive intelligence and infamous for its use of brutal torture,” the FIDH mentioned, stressing that the pair weren’t concerned was at protests. in opposition to al-Assad.
They had been declared useless in 2018. The household was formally notified that Patrick died on January 21, 2014 and his father on November 25, 2017.
In 2016, Mazzen Dabbagh’s spouse and daughter had been evicted from their house in Damascus, which had been requisitioned. In response to the prosecutor, these acts had been “seemingly struggle crimes, extortion and concealment of extortion.”
The investigating judges mentioned it was “sufficiently established” that the 2 males “like hundreds of air pressure intelligence detainees had been tortured to the purpose of demise.”
France begins first struggle crimes trial in opposition to Syrian officers | Struggle information in Syria
Africa Area Information ,Subsequent Massive Factor in Public Knowledg
