French rights groups and associations are seeking to coordinate their efforts to condemn the Assad regime at European and international judicial institutions, such as the European Court and the International Criminal Court.
The rights groups said they had documented horrific abuses against Syrian women, including mass rape and murder. They pointed out that there were around 50,000 women in the prisons of the Assad regime, al-Jazeera said.
A demonstration was held in central Paris on Saturday evening in solidarity with thousands of Syrian women who were held in the prisons of the Assad regime. Last week, France2 TV channel broadcasted a documentary titled “Syria, the Strangled Cry” recounting horrific testimonies of Syrian women raped in Assad prisons.
The protesters held photographs of the women who were interviewed by France2 TV, calling on European and international judicial institutions to seek justice for them and bring symbols of the Assad regime and perpetrators of those crimes to justice.
Samira Mobaied, a Syrian academic and opposition activist, said that there are plans underway to submit a dossier to the European Court and International Criminal Court in order to demand the release of thousands of women who were brutally raped in Assad’s prisons. She said that Assad and pillars of his regime must be declared war criminals after they turned the body of the Syrian women to a battleground.
Françoise Morzier, media official of Amnesty International, said that the Assad regime has used rape of women as a weapon of warfare since the beginning of the revolution in an attempt to crush the popular uprising against it and intimidate the Syrian people.
The international community needed no more evidence to condemn Bashar al-Assad but needed a real political will to bring him to trial, not to negotiations, Morzier added.
Michel Morzier, a human rights activist and president of the Rovever Association for Syrian political refugees in France, called on Western countries to assume their moral and political responsibilities towards the horrific abuses against Syrians, including rape, torture and murder.
Morzier noted that there are about 200,000 Syrians in the Syrian prisons who are being subjected to the most brutal forms of maltreatment, torture and rape.
Abdelmajid Amrari, head of the Paris-based Afdi international human rights organization, said that several rights groups were seeking to bring the Assad regime to trial before the French and Swiss courts. He pointed out that the rights groups are seeking to ensure the launch of an investigation into the documented violations with the aim of arresting Assad regime officials on French and Swiss soil.
Amrari noted that authorizations by victims of rape in Assad’s prisons are being collected in order to file a lawsuit in front of the French and Swiss prosecutors.
Amrari, who is an expert in criminal law, said that the ICC could activate article 5 of Rome Convention and open an investigation into forced disappearances and systematic rape based on the available evidence and testimonies procured by human rights organizations. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)
