of the war and shelter for civilian refugees. web ex got throwed into the garden during cam boat is bloody civil stuff storing us up to here and suddenly we have a ton of x on the canal ruler shed. take anything of value out of the hotel, turn body lip, no more hotels on all, just the syrians of demanding truth and justice. and the new leadership is promising punishments. the crimes committed during more than a century, but is it equipped to carry out this mom effects the sun and will the process be transparent and this is inside the

hello. welcome to the program. and it's me. the head of serious new administration has promised to hunt down everyone who took part in the torture or killing of detainees during the asset regime ok model. shara is even offering rewards for information leading to the arrest. roughly a 150000 people were arrested and forcibly disappeared since the crack down on pro democracy, raleigh's in 2011 with spots the civil war. many a believe to been killed. those who survived best physical or psychological sconce . now families of the victims, demanding justice and accountability, there is no shortage of evidence, but kind of serious new leadership establish a sound legal system to ensure fair trials and won't come into a national community on the united nations due to help. we like funding these questions without guests, but 1st this report by sarah gill and the warning to offer you is the sum of the images in her report. audit study

a torch execution. attacking civilians with chemical weapons using starvation as a weapon of who and the bowman of homes, hospitals, and historical buildings. these are just a few of the atrocities serious form of government is accused of committing. while the ousting of the shaw left side is in moments of celebration for those who suffered under his room, the feelings of bits of sweet, the sub i'm, the joy is mixed with sadness. the regime arrested me fast and then my 3 sons, i'm free now, but they are still missing. i don't know why they all if they were live, the new administration has pledged to unify the divided country, promising justice and accountability. the liberation of

syria does not mean only the vanishing of the tyrant and his group, but also the establishment of the state of justice, dignity, freedom, and pride, and the protection of rights. activists, a monitoring group say there's plenty of evidence of the crimes committed as a mold in 5 decades fast by the father half a cent. and then by his son, the united nations believe move violations will come to light. despite extensive documentation and testimonies, they only scratched the surface of the carswell systems horse. these images are profound testament to unspeakable suffering and pain beyond comprehension, endured by those detained their families, and their loved ones. aside has fled to russia. some say he escaped on punish. activate to of what he used to document, what they say amounts to his government,

school crimes, all adamant that justice will be stopped. sorry. go out to 0. the inside story and that's bringing all guests from london were joined by abraham. a lie, b, a virus to and board member of the syrian purchase consortium. he's researched and advised extensively on international legal cases related to the conflict in syria in washington, dc is roger lou phillips legal director of the syria justice and accountability center, which documents violations of human rights and international law in syria. and also in london, exclude helped me a syringe in less than human rights activist. she's a member of the family's full freedom of movement of women whose relatives were detained and disappeared during the asset regime. welcome table abraham. i'd like to talk with you people in syria, want justice, understandably, and they want to quickly, how can you move quickly enough to stop that from becoming potentially violent

retribution as well. the 1st thing is to be able to capitalize on the enormous evidence that has already been documented. i mean, as you said, in your introduction, the kind of good part of what's been happening for the last 14 years is that certain civil side to international organizations, states or who have been key in to hold the region to accounts have been documenting extensively what's been going on, so when not starting from scratch, that, that's the 1st thing. the 2nd thing is to be able to sit amongst the authorities in damascus. and i'm to sit amongst ourselves as serial actors and be able to put some strategies together. um, all of us are kind of still in the state of happy shaw for what has happened and in syria over the last 10 days. and so it now is the time to really get together and start strategizing. you know what to do next for the last 1014 years we've been looking for trucks. a domestic case, hey, uh, you know,

focusing on chemical weapons only bad just because, you know, there might be some. ready teeth to that, so not the crime of focusing on torture only at the international court of justice because that's the only convention we could. so you know, hold syria to accounting, but all of a sudden a lot more opportunities present themselves. the evidence is that is national organizations that were created specifically for syria. it's document evidence and, and put the evidence for even even to all of the, all file for data like this on our own in the, in, in, in case. and so a lot of the investments and a lot of that the, the, the, the trauma and the pain, the suffering that the families of the don't does have given evidence over the last 2 years is now in good shape to be able to move that process a hand, it would not be a i don't think in a, in a context like syria we have, we have something, you know, kind of an optimum justice. i don't think, you know, looking at the faces of gus children, no or those who lost loved. busy ones in prison, anything could be just this, but what we will do is make sure the perpetrators held accountable,

makes or to have a narrative of what has happened so that no one in a couple of years time will say, oh no i said was great, look what happened to the country now? i'm some of the records that were pretty hearing from so a lot of patients on full to me. roger time is of the essence then, isn't it? absolutely, and we have an enormous opportunity now to build upon the collections of evidence that has been uh, you know, received by civil society organizations. and to build upon that, there has been this veil of secrecy that the syrian government has operated within their been seeks behind that curtain during the last 12 years. and you've obtained a large number of syrian government documents, but i see them out more are now available. and we're in the process of collecting as much as possible to allow these transitional just as frameworks and mechanisms to work. uh, it will be uh, you know, essential for 1st the, the new syrian government to form itself to have a constitutional framework and then to establish

a criminal code so that we can have a process of fair trials that proceed. i think that if the soon community is engaged and they, they're seen, they can see that a collection process is going on, the preservation, the establishment of legal frameworks that they will see the, the wheels of justice and now turning. hello de rogers, just touched on the, on the process is the challenges that lie ahead in getting any trials on the way, but how people need to see justice being done. don't like, how do you persuade them to let they will far to do that unless the appropriate process unfold. so i think the people now they are just looking forward to what is going to happen. but we have to bear in mind that some of these of the disappear people are really a pet of these days. they're lost. they don't know what to do. most of the mothers and the families were waiting for their loved ones. they were they,

they just started top when the prisons opened and they, they, everybody assumed including myself. but i'm going to say my brother when they opened to prison. unfortunately, we haven't seen anyone. i'm so happy for the limited numbers of people of receipts released from prison. but until now we families are lost. we don't know if the documentations are going to be kept, or are we going to lose the documentation? and if they are killed by that a team when and how and the things that we see online because we've been bombarded assignment, he's up to just a few people by misinformation this information on like down the past 12 weeks. so families are now in pain, and i'm not going to say that they could, they are as angry as they could take revenge on their own. now this is never going to happen because they are just like either collapsing, same thing um,

okay. and taking a moment now. all right, it for him. uh, i'm gonna stay many of the uh, in joseph said similar things, but honestly says this is and they started the opportunity to address a horrifying catalogue of human rights violations, including a tax with the chemical weapons, bottled bombs and other war crimes, as well as murder torture and false disappearance at extermination, but amounts to crimes against humanity. well on the do you begin? you know, i think this was part of the original strategy since day one to overload of about in the system i. i think you know, that the decision redeem has picked out every single crime. like it's, it's as if almost they looked at the, you know, the, the, the international criminal court, you know, list of crimes who decided to pick each and every one of them. it's very hard to find a crime in terms of this scale or in terms of the diversity or in terms of the range that those who energy has not committed. but lucky to you, we did not accept to that. you know,

the region will just overwhelm the system to all of it, to kind of push us to an action, to make it unable, unable to move. we have been moving throughout the last 14 years and we will continue. we will continue to move. um, obviously the, the, the range of crimes and the, and the magnitude of crowds make it, make it hard to kind of prioritize, make it hard to know where, where to focus on on this process will take time. and it will take a lot of consultations that will take a lot of engagement. but i think what we have kind of a united voice on is that we will not kind of forget and we will keep pushing. we have been pushing for us, the accountability, i gaze much more difficult on against, on a redeemed, as being normalized reads, media, and internationally. i guess to redeem that have a seat of the united nations and was nothing every asset against all these on the syrian act as they're in survive isn't victims and associations and, and you. busy and you know, our allies within the international communities which were not, many of you know, towards the end of the film of off,

off the time could kind of kept pushing to the issue. the issue on the tape. ringback so we will definitely not be overwhelmed by the range of crime is just a matter of time before we try and process what has happened and be we are in a sort of base to stop raja, even before the events of the last week. i know your organization, the syria, just as an accountability center, you've been collecting one over 2000000 pieces of documentation of the conflict conducting research already. but it does seem almost overwhelming in terms of the voting of crimes that need investigating how, how do you stopped and indeed it, there is a huge amount of criminality that took place over the last 12 years and even longer . i think we need to look at all of the above solutions and follow a clue that was provided by ukraine. example, the i, c, c, should be pursued as an opportunity. universal jurisdiction prosecutions can continue to move forward as they have to date. there will be a number of

a former resume officials that end up in europe and could be subject to prosecution . in the very near term, while syria is undertaking is process of creating legal frameworks to allow the creation of a new mechanism that could have some international assistance. and i didn't, if i appropriate uh, personnel, judges and lawyers in order to staff the institution and, and proceed with the vast majority of cases. all right, well, we'll come back to the mechanisms shortly about how, how just this might be delivered by allude. i mean, you've witnessed in your hometown of diet, the shootings, and the tensions of people, the styles of the civil war and your own brother. i've met how me was detained in 2012 and detained for 3 years. what it, what lessons have you learn from your own personal circumstances and what you've experienced as to how you believe people will get justice and should get justice of . first of all, it took us a long time to then the left and then within the hub,

if i may say that i, or 2 months ago i was in the, i wasn't in despair. i lost faith in hope and everything. but to do we are sad is gone now and we just stored hope. so we believe that the way to just this is going to be achieved one day and it's going to be near because it took effect and he has to topple that a team. and now i think we need another 14 years to set them accountable, but we persist on setting them accountable. we will never lose face, even if somebody come to me now and he says like your brother was killed under torture or anywhere in his cell. i need the buddy and i need to very all the my to the people who were mounted by that a team in prisons. and we need the bodies of the missing persons, the ones that we don't know if they are alive or dead or taken by today to forces or any other forces. i know that we know that we do have legal support from our

colleagues and from the organizations working on accountability in syria. but we so the families will never settle until we achieve justice for our loved ones every. and we're not just talking about the shadow left side. all we were talking about is father, which will be about the 40000 people killed and hammer in 1982. there is a lot of justice, an investigation that needs to be done. isn't that as well? and yes, i mean, absolutely, this has been an error review of 54 years and starting from from his, his, his father that died. but also the uncle with to is that all have, we don't know exactly where, where he is now. he wasn't switch, then there was an arrest warrant against them christmas and for the crimes who committed to come on. then he saw the transfusion of thoughts uh, syria. we know we. ready be looking definitely for a lot of these individuals. and yes, it's a, it's a, it's a whole,

a process of people and, you know, it's, it's enough for authors that there's also a very bureaucratic, in the way it commits torture and uncommitted these crimes. i mean, looking at the pictures and the images that are coming out, these were orders given that they're keeping the names, they're keeping. exactly, you know, what's happened to these other 2 to these individuals? it's not, it's, it's an industry, it's a, it's an industry by all means. and there are people who are responsible for these, for this industry. and obviously that search will continue. and then all of them are alive. and i mean in the, in the, in the way, i personally, i'm happy that they are on the, i've in order to be able to watch and see 1st of all of a celebration, 3rd taking place in damascus and other places with the phone of that redeem and how people are living under freedom in that sense and. busy so that they're seeing that there are a lot of us who will. busy trust the day until their health uh to account in a way they know that political bargains happen. and if enough pressure is applied on those harboring them, they will be handed over and they will be found. and this is not something that we,

we will give up on. we were not scared to do that during when the regime wasn't up most power. and how does embassies informants everywhere? it will definitely not stop now. so it's a very more convenient and national community do to help syria. now the country that doesn't really have an effective legal, would you additional system? it's over whelmed, perhaps by all of this, by all of these crimes committed. how does the international community help immediately? i mean, the 1st thing to do is to be able to or prioritize the issue of accountability and make it on the, on, on the top or fall of the agenda is, you know, i'm, i know refugee return is important. i know there's a lot i come to develop is an important metric. busy so need to see that justice and accountability is, is, is, uh, is on the page that is on the narrative as i is on the rhetoric and so far, so good on, on the, the 2nd thing is to be able to engage with the syrians who have been leading these, these assets for many years to kind of consult with them as to where and when they could come in the midst of these beans. national of course, of this be domestic chords. you know, this is this,

there is not the 1st conflict and not the 1st conflict that had introduced 3 that is complicit in the, in, in, in the crimes that the regime has a, has committed there. so many different companies across the world with that we can done lessons from so there is a lot that need and that needs to be done, but keeping it on the table now, i think is an absolute priority and be full about priority of accountability. we have, we have the priority to, to talk to you about it, which is the idea of the missing and the idea of the mass graves and the idea of some sort of closure for that. but for. busy loved ones, i think that is extremely tiring, imperative before anything so that we can move in terms of like on to accountability and injustice. but there's a lot that the international community can do and it, and it should have started a week ago. we're seeing kind of states already kind of picking up the narrative and offering assistance where they, roger off people send decided to serious and people to the i, c, j all they to be tried in syria. how do you help syria cope with the, with the volume of people all the lessons we can learn from other uh,

war crimes tribunals in recent decades? well, i think 1st of all, the basic samantha terry needs need to be met. and at a big step in that regard will be to list sanctions against h t as in against giovanni, so that the international community can give some semantics area and support food, water, electricity, other things need to be in place before you can have a meaningful system of justice, the, the triple i am, was created for the investigation and support for crimes that occurred in syria over the last 12 years. and so there's a ready made you an institution that has some case files that have been developed, but preeminence as he brings said that that needs to be the input of syrian organizations, the syrians within the diaspora that have worked tirelessly to build, you know, collections of evidence into support cases that have been moving forward in europe and i c, j. so um, you know, the syrians need to be front and center leading this process. roger,

you talk about lifting the, suggesting and lifting the tires to designation on h t. s, but already in the last 48 hours or so republican us and democratic us senate, as i said, it's too early to do that. but i think you're saying that really it needs to be done now before it's too late. well, in so far as it's preventing humanitarian assistance from going into syria, from engaging directly with the authorities there, i think we need to give a level a level of margin to the, the new syrian government so that they can be successful. if the, there's a political reluctance to engage directly then through intermediaries assistance must be provided. and hello, do you see any value in pushing for the listing of the terrace designation of h t s on it's on his leadership? so i don't know how useful this is. going to be but i like

as a like as a syrian citizen, i don't know if this is going to be for the good or not. maybe it's going to work on kind of achieving some piece and supplement currently at this, at this level. but um, i'm like, we're still anticipating, i can't decide to be honest. okay. but we're on both of those people who, i mean you're looking at those potentially tens of thousands of people involved with. busy king and the security operates as well the syrian government, not everybody's going to get justice perhaps. do you want to see those people tried in syria or tried elsewhere? what sort of international help do you think she'll be brought to a to, to syria? and like at like, and i'm in the, the best scenario we need to see them child in syria and they said, and people will attend all the trials and see what they have done to the syrian people. but this is the dream. and i know now that dreams can be,

can become true, and if not, then we will pursue them outside. so this is, this is the how it persisted in the families of the to separate people and how persistent the syrian people were. and even aware support is from the international organizations are regarding the syrian atrocities and violations committed by the state. and they do mainly, but also anybody else who was involved supporting indicating, i'm the only dis asked is that we have been through all over the past 1314 years or abraham, the international criminal tribunals, the ones b of a slob. yet less than 24 years. full 1000 plus witnesses, a $161.00 individuals sentenced real one to 21 years. 62 people sentence. but then the volume of crimes pails in significance to what you might be looking at in syria. what lessons could you draw from the. ready tribunals if you look at what

syria needs as well, i think the test documents already did learn. it's less than to not wait until after the conflict to start documenting or supporting documentation assets and that's already something that's been happening since 2011 with the you and commission of inquiry. and then in 2016 with the um, with the trip and i am the, the mechanism there under mentioned. and that its role is to assist in the prosecution of these, of these crimes. it's not a quote itself, but it was created for this day when courts might be be created so, so that, that's the 1st thing. the 2nd thing i think um between you can log in. ready on that we also had all the comments being established domestically hybrid with international supp. busy and. busy and all of the lessons went on that in terms of efficiency in terms of speed, in terms of access to victims and, and, and so on. but yes, it might, it might be a lengthy process and i think it's, it is not necessarily a bad thing to have it in the process where it allows people to see justice done. i don't think swift to just as in this, in this situation or long just as is

a binary since you is a binary issue, we need to be able. ready to grieve when you do, we need to be able to remember, we need to say that amount of evidence come out. this is about, you know, every individual. busy of every family, every victim is for people to sit and watch a through this thing. it's a, it's about applying pressure. busy for all these times and you know, we, we, when we, when we really cool, because navea and ro, one done. so it'd be, we call the recall the war crimes tribunal. but within that, implicitly we're recording that these were crime scenes. these were not just the conflicts that were. busy and upset the fact that, you know, travino's were established. i took that long of a time. exactly. did you set the amount of witnesses that, that, that is a reflection of the criminality of, of, of the regions that at that time. so in a way from a narrative perspective, from the remembrance perspective. busy from a, a, a due process perspective you. busy it's not necessarily about thankful for justice to take its course, but again, but not starting from scratch. we're starting with a huge amount of evidence. but he, where we're starting with

a huge amount of resilience and persistence from the, from syrian men and women who, you know, throughout the use i've been pushing. and then i, i can only imagine what they would be doing now in terms of coming forward and, and giving the statements and so on. oh, we're dealing with more experienced international committee. so overall, i am optimistic as to what would come next. but i think we need to get our act together 1st of all as they're in actors and they're working. busy this and to be able to sit together and figure out different strategies of how to move ahead. raja and who do you prioritize when you're looking at to how to how to bring cases. they'll be many people low down the wrong. so say they have no choice, it is not a defense as well for them, but who, who do concentrate on. so if you have to stop somewhat a hey, and indeed you do. but if you have a variety of mechanisms operating, then i don't think you have to make strict choices. i think the international tribunals are well suited to prosecuting the senior leaders in those most responsible. but they alone cannot obtain

a comprehensive justice as you mention from the isaac you. why nicely to you are experiences to supplement those courts. there were domestic tribunals created that in the i think the newest lava situation, there was the bosnian war crimes court is created domestically, sort of a hybrid institution prostituted many more hundreds of cases and, and there were one example there are traditional justice measures pursued called a good child should proceedings, and those a 100000 individuals would process through that uh, traditional justice mechanism. and so i think for syria as well, we need to have a system whereby the highest level of senior leaders are prosecuted. and then also mid level leaders, i think the decision was made by h t. s to grant, and the amnesty to uh, the con scripts who were not in involved in killing of any syrians. and i think that's a reasonable decision to be made. but that leaves a huge number of individuals that could be subject to prosecution in the future.

and the steering community needs to be engaged so that they can make those decisions. hello, just lastly with you. there is a huge reckoning to come for syria, as it prepares to look at the horrors of the past decades. how do you, how do you propose about how to syrians for past without that reckoning, that's to come a okay, so for the, the groups of this are 5 is if i may speak from this level, are grouping together. they've been preparing themselves for a long time. all of them are working on documentation at taking care of each other, doing psycho social support for the families, and also making sure that we are all persistent, the ones who can hand up and continue the struggle. uh, to get the i mean to get to the last point when everybody is going to be

recognized, an overpayment is going to be want to weigh we. i bet we've been working on this for a long time. we didn't have the hope that aside is going to to, to be toppled down that quick or any time to be honest, but now it's all gone. and we didn't have a long past to go on. yeah. okay. all right. well, thanks to all guess on. good luck to well i guess to abraham a lobby to roger lou phillips and to flute help me and thank you to for watching. you can see the program again any time by visiting our website address, eric dot com. and for further discussion, go to a facebook page, thoughts, facebook dot com, forward slash a inside story. you can also during the conversation on x, on instagram, we are a j inside story for me, furniture. and the whole thing here. by the

a meeting of mine. when i was studying the canon and the curriculum that we went towards was handed down from elsewhere, it was an inherited curriculum. that is the image of architecture in the west. architects that may a valley and alejandro ravenna. but one that was for something that social housing cannot provide, which is personal expression, fried studio, be unscripted on allergies. era. all of latin america for most of my career, but no countries alike. and its my job to shed light on how and why the

the, [000:00:00;00] the to, i'm sort of any, it's good to have you with us. this is the news our lives from the coming up in the program today. israel says, risks of not disappeared with the fall of the charlotte side and hits dozens of what it calls, minute 3 targets and syria. hundreds of syrian soldiers under the sod regime wait