Syrian Justice Issues Absentee Arrest Warrant Against Bashar Al-Assad
The Syrian Ministry of Justice has issued an absentee arrest warrant against former Syrian President Bashar Hafez Al-Assad (mother's name: Anisa), in a move that is the first of its kind since the fall of his regime.
The text of the warrant, issued by the seventh investigating judge in Damascus, states that the wanted person, who is 60 years old, is "wanted for crimes related to:
• Intentional murder of two or more persons.
• Assault with the intent to incite civil war.
• Acts of torture leading to death."
The warrant is based on articles "535, 533, 534, and 298 of the General Penal Code, in addition to the provisions of the Anti-Torture Law No. 16 of 2022".
The warrant titled "Absentee Arrest Warrant" includes detailed physical descriptions of the wanted person, including: "Height approximately 189 cm, broad forehead, long nose, thin lips, blue eyes, widely spaced eyebrows, brown hair, and oval face".
The warrant obliges "the relevant security authorities to arrest Bashar Al-Assad wherever he may be found, and to place him in the appropriate detention facility according to the provisions of the law, with the armed forces tasked with executing it and assisting in that".
The warrant was issued within "File No. (1) related to the prosecution of the events in Daraa", indicating "the opening of an official investigation into the violations committed in the governorate in 2011, which sparked the Syrian revolution".
This local step comes about nine months after "the fall of the Assad regime in December 2024, following the victory of the Syrian revolution", and "Assad's resort to Russia where he was granted humanitarian asylum" after "the collapse of the Ba'ath regime that lasted 61 years".
The warrant coincides with judicial movements in Europe, where the French judiciary issued in August last "seven arrest warrants against senior former officials in the Syrian regime, headed by Bashar Al-Assad, on charges of complicity in the bombing of a press center in the city of Homs in 2012 that resulted in the death of American journalist Marie Colvin and French photographer Rémi Ochlik, and injured other journalists".
These warrants included "his brother Maher Al-Assad, the actual commander of the Fourth Division at the time, and intelligence chief Ali Mamlouk, and the army chief of staff at the time Ali Ayoub".
Human rights organizations, including "the International Federation for Human Rights and the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression", considered this step "a precursor to a trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by the Syrian regime".
