President of the Syrian Coalition Abdurrahman Mustafa called on the international community to increase efforts to hold accountable perpetrators of war crimes in Syria as key to reaching a real political solution.
President Mustafa was commenting on the French judiciary’s issuance of arrest warrants for three senior Assad regime’s intelligence officers, namely Ali Mamlouk, chief of national security, Jamil Hassan, director of the air force intelligence, and Abdul Salam Mahmoud, head of the investigations branch of the Air Force Intelligence.
“The international community has done very little to hold accountable the perpetrators of these crimes,” Mustafa said, adding that the efforts that has been made in this regard does not correspond with the sheer size of the atrocities that have been committed in Syria over the past eight years.”
President Mustafa stressed that the country needs a “sustainable” political solution, pointing out that this solution depends on “the principle of accountability” for the crimes committed in Syria, especially by the Assad regime officials.
Moreover, President Mustafa stressed that the place of perpetrators of these crimes should be “in cages inside law courts and not in a political solution,” in reference to the international community’s continued consideration of the Assad regime as part of the political process.
Meanwhile, human rights activists called for the issuance of new arrest warrants for the Assad regime officials as all the orders to kill were issued by the head of the regime.
French newspaper Le Monde on Monday reported that French prosecutors issued international arrest warrants for three senior Syrian intelligence and Assad regime officials, especially security chief Ali Mamlouk for collusion in war crimes and crime against humanity. The move was part of a long-running lawsuit that the French judiciary has been investigating since 2016. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)
