Senior Syrian officials face trial for war crimes in Paris.
There's a court case happening in Paris involving three high-ranking Syrian officials who are believed to have been responsible for the deaths of two French citizens in Syria. These officials are being tried in their absence and they're accused of aiding and abetting crimes against humanity and war crimes. If found guilty, they could face life imprisonment.
The story surrounds two French-Syrian men who were arrested by the air force intelligence in Damascus on November 3 and 4, 2013. Their bodies were handed over to their relatives in the form of death certificates in August 2018. The documents show that the men passed away in 2014 and 2017, without their families seeing their bodies. Witnesses claim that the two men were transported to an airport in Damascus - known as a place where many opposition members were allegedly detained, subjected to torture, and killed during that period.
The three individuals on trial are Ali Mamluk, Jamil Hassan, and Abdel Salam Mahmud. Mamluk was the head of the Syrian National Security Bureau and was considered a close friend and trusted advisor to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Hassan used to be the head of Syrian air force intelligence.
Reports by Syrian victims state that hundreds of people believed to be opponents of Assad were tortured and killed under his leadership. Salam Mahmud, meanwhile, was in charge of the Air Force Intelligence Investigation Department at a significant military airport near Damascus, where the two dual citizens were held captive.
Lawyer Clémence Bectarte, who's representing the International Federation for Human Rights (fidh), stated that classifying the case as a crime against humanity by the French judiciary is crucial. It implies that there's evidence of these men being victims of a policy enacted by the Syrian government to suppress the entire Syrian population.
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The detention of the two French-Syrian men by Syrian air force intelligence in 2013 has been linked to the war crimes trial in Paris, as one of the defendants, Salam Mahmud, was in charge of the department where they were held. The threat of retaliation against civil servants involved in this war crimes trial in Paris has been raised, potentially affecting those working on this case in Paris.
Source: www.ntv.de
