June 26 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Paris Court of Appeal has upheld the arrest warrant issued in November last year against the president of Syria, Bashar al Assad, for his alleged complicity in war crimes and crimes against humanity for the chemical weapons attacks carried out in August 2013 against Eastern Ghouta.
The French Prosecutor’s Office had appealed the order against Al Assad on the grounds that the Syrian president enjoys immunity due to his status as head of state, a thesis that the Court of Appeals has not shared, in a ruling issued this Wednesday and revealed by the plaintiff organizations. .
These organizations, including the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression, Open Society and Syrian Archive, have celebrated in a statement what they consider “a significant step forward for survivors and victims of chemical attacks and for justice.” international”.
In this regard, they have pointed out that the ruling “unequivocally establishes that accountability for international crimes rules out any argument of immunity.” The judicial case opened in France also points to other people in the Syrian president’s entourage, including his brother, Maher al Assad.
The attacks examined in this lawsuit took place in August 2013 and caused hundreds of deaths, although there is no clear toll of victims. The experts did confirm the use of sarin gas, prohibited by International Law, and although the Al Assad regime has never acknowledged authorship, powers such as the United States or the European Union did understand it.
Both in Eastern Ghouta and in other places where similar incidents had also been recorded, including Douma and Adra, the pattern was similar, since these were areas controlled by forces opposed to the Al Assad regime.
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