The Syrian presidency on Thursday extended by three months the deadline for a national inquiry into the massacre of hundreds of members of the Alawite minority community of ousted leader Bashar al-Assad.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said more than 1,700 people, mainly Alawites, died in days of mass killings in March in the main Alawite region on Syria’s Mediterranean coast. The group blamed security forces and their allies of carrying out the worst violence since al-Assad’s downfall in December.
The government of president Ahmed al-Sharaa, whose opposition group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) led the offensive that toppled al-Assad, accused Assad followers of setting off the violence by attacking security forces.
The president set up an inquiry commission in mid-March but there have since been calls by Amnesty International and other rights bodies for the perpetrators to be held accountable.
The president’s office said it was extending for three months the investigation’s mandate after studying the preliminary report which had sought more time.
It said the extension was “not-renewable” and that a final report had to be handed over by the deadline.
“It will be for the independent national commission of inquiry to establish the facts and evaluate them, in line with its mandate, with the independence and vast powers that have been conferred by a presidential decree,” the office said.
AFP
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