France Seeks To Pursue Legal Action Against Syrian Regime For War Crimes

Syria, currently engulfed in a seemingly endless civil conflict, has long been the source of war crime allegations and human rights abuses. Last month, France began the preliminary steps to open a judicial investigation, based on photographic evidence of torture, against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. A Syrian defector using the protective code name ‘Caesar’ provided 55,000 photographs evidencing acts of torture perpetrated by the Syrian regime against its citizens. The photographs testify to the deaths of 11,000 prisoners within two Syrian military hospitals. The defector was tasked with photographing the bodies for record keeping purposes, and the material recovered from his defection lead to a UN report documenting Syria’s violations of international law.

The French government, after finalizing a process of authentication of the photographs, is leading efforts to prosecute the Syrian President. In order to have jurisdiction within their own courts, the French must find evidence of harm done to a French national or arrest a Syrian official in relation to the case.

The photographs presented by Caesar were taken between 2011 and 2013 prior to his defection in 2013. It has proven surprisingly difficult to persuade the international community to act on the photographic evidence, especially considering that Caesar himself presented the photos to the U.S. House Committee on Foreign Affairs in July of 2013. Two years later, his plea for greater American action in the face of countless human rights abuses has rung hollow.

At the time of the hearing, Caesar and his legal representatives were already dissatisfied  with the way the U.S. government was dealing with the evidence. The Syrian defector had handed 27,000 photos to the FBI in order for them to identify any foreign nationals in order to begin legal proceedings against Assad. Complaining of the slow pace of the FBI’s identification work, Caesar did not release the entirety of the 55,000 photographs and threatened to seek the help of another government.

It is now evident that the Syrian defector looked across the Atlantic for a government more supportive of his cause. France was an obvious choice, given its strong opposition to Assad and its continued efforts to address human rights abuses in Syria. In 2014, the French government issued a proposition in the UN Security Council to bring those responsible for using chemical weapons in Syria to justice through the International Criminal Court, but predictably that proposal was rejected by Russia.

Only last month at the UN General Assembly, French President François Hollande once again declared that Assad should not be part of the process for change in Syria. Fellow NATO allies, the UK and the USA, share this sentiment, though both David Cameron and Barack Obama have been more reluctant recently to demand the outright removal of Assad. Cameron, shifting his prior position, conceded that Assad might be part of a transitional process. Nevertheless, he maintained that the Syrian leader needed to face criminal charges for his crimes.

Unsurprisingly, Syria has repeatedly refuted any allegations of torture. Given the early stages of the investigation, it is difficult to see where the prosecution will lead, but there is little chance that Assad will be facing a criminal court in the near future. Nonetheless, the international pressure created by France’s attitude towards Syria will no doubt lead to a renewed push for him to step down. A key factor in the success of France’s efforts depends largely on Russia’s reaction. Vladimir Putin, as Assad’s principal ally, will likely seek to deflect any efforts to delegitimize the Syrian President in order to maintain his influence in the region.