The Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR) said the Syrian regime is actively appointing military leaders involved in crimes against humanity and war crimes to the highest levels of civilian leadership in the state.
The newly released report contains details on at least 14,737 individuals who are believed to be involved in committing one or more types of violations, with the vast majority of these people working under the auspices of the Syrian regime and its allies.
As the report notes, this database’s inclusion of individuals whom SNHR believes to be involved in practicing violations relies on the identification of the relevant rules of customary humanitarian law in holding commanders and other senior officials responsible for war crimes committed by their subordinates pursuant to their orders, meaning that they should be held accountable if they knew, or had reason to know, that these subordinates were about to commit or were committing such crimes and failed to take all necessary and reasonable measures in their power to prevent their commission, or if such crimes had been committed, to punish the persons responsible. The report notes that the International Criminal Court Statute expands the elements of this responsibility to include crimes against humanity, which are committed in time of peace or war, and war crimes. This law also holds military commanders in addition to senior officials, including civilians, responsible for this.
The report also notes that the various institutions of the Syrian regime have been involved in committing widespread and systematic violations, many of which constitute crimes against humanity and war crimes, with everyone who ordered, incited, encouraged, justified, participated, provided assistance in or facilitated those crimes considered to be involved in them; at the forefront of these institutions are those of the army and the security bodies.
The report refers to the five decrees issued by the President of the Syrian regime, in which he dismissed and replaced the incumbent governors in five Syrian governorates, namely Homs, Daraa, Suwayda, Quneitra, and Hasaka; among the figures appointed to take over in these positions was Major General Ghassan Halim Khalil, who was appointed governor of Hasaka.
As the report reveals, Ghassan Halim Khalil worked as Head of the State Security services’ infamous ‘255’ Information Branch during the period between 2010-2013; this branch incorporates a number of important sections, such as those dealing with religions, political parties, and monitoring of local and international media and Internet websites, in addition to being engaged in activities to support and promote pro-Syrian regime websites that justify the regime’s violations. The report notes that in 2013, Ghassan Khalil was appointed Head of the External Branch, Branch 279, and in 2017, he was appointed as an assistant director of the State Security Department. He also supervised the regime’s so-called ‘Syrian Electronic Army’, which carries out hacking operations and sabotage against websites and pages opposing the Syrian regime, and tracks journalists and activists with the aim of arresting and torturing them. He is also one of the individuals included in the European, Canadian and the UK sanctions lists.
SNHR stressed that the Syrian regime works to keep all military and civilian leadership positions in the hands of its accomplices in committing crimes against humanity and war crimes so that their fate is always linked to the regime’s fate in an organic, interconnected manner, meaning that defending it becomes an essential part of defending themselves.
The report also reveals that the leadership positions within the security services and the army are mainly based on first: Absolute blind loyalty to the Syrian regime, including the commission of atrocious violations against the Syrian citizens and state, which violate International Human Rights Law and International Humanitarian Law, and often violate the current Syrian constitution; second: Sectarian discrimination in favor of the Alawite sect, from which the vast majority of the leaders of the security services and the army come, which the report notes is a form of blatant discrimination on the basis of sectarianism which violates the most basic tenets of International Human Rights Law as well as violating the Syrian constitution itself; and third: Appointments have been made in the Syrian state with the aim of placating Iran’s and Russia’s leaders in order to serve their interests in the army, security forces, civilian positions, science research centers, ports, and crossings, as the report reveals.
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