When I was 10 years old, I was first introduced to the concept of freedom with the beginning of the Syrian revolution.
I come from a Syrian family from the city of Homs but I never lived in Syria. Like a lot of people, I visited the country many times and fell in love with it, and as I grew older, I chose to shape all my studies around understanding how I can contribute to the revolution and holding the Assad regime accountable for its crimes, to echo the values of Syrians’ demand for freedom. Now, I study a Masters in Transitional Justice.
Throughout my studies, I at times felt isolated from the diaspora justice process for Syria as I felt ‘not Syrian enough’, a feeling I am sure many members of the Syrian 2nd generation diaspora feel. Now that the Assad regime has finally fallen, I am searching for the best way to contribute to the rebuilding of our country, as a member of the diaspora and as a Syrian person that cares.
I want this article to be a place to start mapping the work that has already been done by the Syrian civil society, to avoid duplication and to continue the conversation on transitional justice for our country.
A defaced portrait of ousted Syrian president Bashar al-Assad stands in a ransacked government security facility, in Damascus, on December 8, 2024. (Photo by Rami al SAYED / AFP) (Photo by RAMI AL SAYED/AFP via Getty Images).
Ultimately, I want to answer the question that any young, passionate or (re-)politicised Syrian may ask: Assad has fallen, but what can we do for our country now?
What is Transitional Justice: A Personal Definition
Transitional Justice (TJ) is often referred to in a legal scope as the “legal responses that deal with the wrongdoing of repressive predecessor regimes”, with five pillars associated with it : truth, justice, reparations, memorialisation and guarantees of non-recurrence.
Personally, I interpret TJ as all the processes, initiatives, projects, and movements that have and will lead to creating a Syria where everyone is free and feels free no matter their background and without this freedom being co-opted by external parties. This is what many Syrian civil society actors have been working towards for 14 years or more.
So, how prepared are we?
Mapping the Syrian CSOs’ initiatives in Transitional Justice
TJ initiatives have been in progress for many years in the Syrian civic space,particularly in Northern Syria, but full-scale freedom could not be achieved with the presence of the repressive Assad regime. Now, it is time to put in practice the theories and projects developed by Syrian CSOs that fall under four categories: documentation of the revolution and human rights violations, criminal trials, truth-seeking initiatives, and preparatory plans for a post-Assad Syria.
- Documenting the Syrian Revolution –
With 14 years of rampant impunity for horrific war crimes and crimes against humanity, the Syrian people have been left on their own to document, archive and show the world what Assad did to the country. Still, this documentation had little effect on destroying the monster of disinformation created by the Assad regime and its allies within the international community.
However, what these efforts created is an impressive archive of verified information, reports, and databases that can be used as evidence to fight impunity in post-Assad Syria.
Some very significant initiatives in the documentation domain include organisations fact-checking videos, pictures and documents exposing human rights violations and attacks on infrastructure by the regime and various armed groups in the country. Namely, the Syrian Revolution Archive, the Syrian Archive (as part of Mnemonic), the Syrian Network of Human Rights (SNHR), and the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression (SCM), amongst others, have been working on this[1].
[1] I am currently working on a comprehensive yet non-exhaustive list of Syrian CSOs doing archival work.
The Syrian Archives’ Methodology of Research. Available at: https://syrianarchive.org/
An event organised by the Syrian Design Archive with the Syrian Oxford Society. Available at: https://www.instagram.com/p/C3A0OnDMPbm/?hl=en&img_index=1
There have also been huge amounts of documentation about the events of the revolution through artistic means. Projects working on this include the Creative Memory Archive and the Syrian Design Archive. In addition, countless documentary movies have been made exposing the crimes committed by the Assad regime.
These initiatives have created a strong base of evidence of the war crimes and crimes against humanity that can be used in processes of accountability of members of the Assad regime, as they include the names of the perpetrators, the locations and dates of the violations and the sequences of events as well as direct testimonies by the victims/survivors.
To strengthen the impact of these archival efforts, unifying organisations like Madaniya (see below) can bolster work on providing an easily-accessible and comprehensive database of this work to be used in accountability trials.
- Criminal Trials of Regime Members –
Following up on the important archival work done by the Syrian people, Syrian legal groups have worked hard on holding accountable the perpetrators of torture and murder under the Syrian regime by using the concept of universal and transnational jurisdiction. This was significantly seen in the 2020 case of Anwar Raslan in Germany, where a Syrian regime colonel was convicted of torture of detainees of conscience. Many such cases followed suit.
Whereas these cases were previously small-scale, they have given the Syrian civil society working on criminal trials the experience to tackle the mountain of trials that need to take place with the change of powers. Many crimes are being uncovered with Assad’s fall and evidence must be handled with care so as not to jeopardise accountability trials.
Organisations like the Syrian Legal Development Programme, already having taken part in trials in Europe, have activated an accessible awareness campaign to advise those on the ground on how to handle evidence, including how to refer the evidence to UN human rights mechanisms. This is the type of knowledge Syrian CSOs gained throughout the revolution, waiting for the day of wide-spread accountability.
A demonstration outside the courthouse where former Syrian intelligence officer Anwar Raslan stands on trial in Koblenz, western Germany, on January 13, 2022. (Photo by Bernd Lauter / AFP) (Photo by BERND LAUTER/AFP via Getty Images)
In moving forward with criminal trials, we also have to ask ourselves where such trials will take place. Facilitating the access to justice of the Syrian people could be a crucial role for any new government that wishes to rebuild societal trust. This means, at the very least, to provide ample space (literally and metaphorically) to the Syrian civil society to participate and/or lead criminal trials and to aid the Syrian people in reclaiming their stolen rights, such as property rights. An organisation to consult with much experience in House, Land and Property rights is The Day After.
- Truth-Seeking in the Decay of Assad’s Disinformation Campaigns –
The Assads, having left behind them 54 years of disinformation, are the reason for countless accusations and denialist rhetoric rejecting even the most obvious of violations that occurred in Syria. To name a few, the Assad regime has forcibly disappeared approximately 100’000 people since March 2011, and attacked civilians 217 times with chemical weapons.
An Infographic by Don’t Suffocate the Truth: Map of the Chemical Attacks in Syria. Available at:
https://donotsuffocatetruth.com/en/infographics/17#infographic
From the denial of these horrific events, arose organisations specifically dedicated to establishing the truth. For instance, the Don’t Suffocate the Truth Campaign has promoted the truth about the use of chemical weapons in Syria to counteract an intense disinformation campaign by Russia and the Assad regime on this topic. In this regard, Don’t Suffocate the Truth can support by providing evidence, the work of groups like The Syria Campaign and the White Helmets that have called for the formation of an Exceptional Chemical Weapons Tribunal (ECWT) to investigate and prosecute the users of chemical weapons in Syria.
As for enforced disappearances, countless on-going campaigns have formed by victims/survivors of the crime to establish the whereabouts of their loved ones. For instance, a coalition of associations raising awareness of enforced disappearances of detainees of conscience launched the Truth and Justice Charter in February 2021, which eventually led to the creation of the new UN Independent Institution on Missing Persons in Syria in June 2023, a mechanism for the search and identification of ‘missing people’ in Syria.
In uncovering Assad’s crimes after his fall, mass graves have been discovered across the country, one of which an estimated 100 ‘000 unidentified bodies are buried. In this context, it is crucial to protect the evidence at all costs to identify and bring back the bodies to their families for proper burial. Coming back to the SNHR, it has published crucial Guidelines on the Treatment of Mass Graves in Post-Armed Conflict Syria. These are more ways the Syrian civil society has prepared itself for the large-scale process of transition to justice, accountability, reparations and stable freedom.
DARAA, SYRIA – DECEMBER 16: Teams work on the uncovered 12 mass graves, believed to contain the remains of civilians killed by the ousted Assad regime, in Daraa, Syria on December 16, 2024. (Photo by Bekir Kasim/Anadolu via Getty Images)
To bring all of these crimes together, and to elucidate comprehensive truth, many groups, including the SNHR and the SCM, have advocated for the creation of a Truth Commission, to fully investigate the crimes committed in Syria by the Assad regime and its allies and to create the basis for widespread criminal prosecutions. This Truth Commission needs to be urgently supported by the international community and any new Syrian government.
- Preparing for the Fall of Assad –
As anticipatory plans for the fall of the brutal regime, the Syrian civil society has created critical legal, political, and economic documents to help guide the process of democratisation and achieve full freedom in the country. Here are three examples to illustrate my point:
First, the SCM developed in 2022 a 60 page handbook on applying practical solutions to the TJ process in Syria, drawing on experiences of TJ in other countries and adapting entrenched concepts of TJ specifically to the Syrian context. In a similar vein, The Day After wrote a detailed plan on gender-sensitive TJ in Syria. Such documents should be indispensable to human rights activists in the Syrian context.
Second, the Center for Legal Studies and Research coordinated an important project in which Syrians of all backgrounds were consulted and given 10 workshops on constitutional culture, the result of which was the drafting of a constitution “with the aim of laying the foundations and mechanisms to protect [Syria’s] future from repeating past mistakes”. This is a full constitution with 282 articles addressing freedom and equality. Again, workers in TJ could use this constitution as a very helpful starting point.
Third, the Madaniya initiative was created in the context of the revolution to reclaim political agency for civic actors in and outside of Syria. With the fall of the regime, they went from a diaspora initiative, to a group established in the Syrian capital. Uniting over 200 Syrian CSOs, this group has prepared a bloc of Syrian civil society groups that can serve as a powerful united entity pushing for lasting freedom in the country.
Madaniya Press Conference in Damascus. Available at: https://www.instagram.com/madaniyanetwork/p/DD4xp_7sedK/?img_index=1
What now?
Now is the time to push the mechanisms and archives developed by Syrian civil society even further, to achieve deep and relentless accountability for the perpetrators of human rights violations in the country in the past 14 years. Everyone has a role to play.
To all those wondering what they can do for their country, I have provided examples of organisations whose initiatives you can contact and help strengthen. As for the organisations with active initiatives, let in newcomers with an open heart to the work you have been doing, as generations of young activists will be knocking on your door. Syria needs all its people of conscience, now is the time for collaboration and building trust, more than ever before.
This article was submitted by Lily RADWAN. Lily is a Syrian of the second generation diaspora in Europe. Since the Syrian revolution started in 2011, she has dedicated her time to researching, learning, organising and supporting the revolution and its goals towards freedom. This led her to her current Masters studies in Transitional Justice to answer the question: what can be done now that the Syrian regime has fallen.