The French prosecutor has appealed the Court of Appeal’s decision, which upheld the arrest warrant against Bashar al-Assad in the chemical weapons case.
On Tuesday, July 2, 2024, the Paris prosecutor’s office announced that it had filed a case with the Court of Cassation to address a legal issue related to the arrest warrant for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who is implicated in crimes against humanity due to chemical attacks that occurred in Syria in 2013.
The prosecutor’s office stated that there is strong evidence against Bashar al-Assad indicating his possible involvement in these chemical attacks. Without questioning the essence of the case, the office emphasized the necessity for the highest judicial court to review the decision made by the Court of Appeal regarding the immunity of a head of state from crimes committed while in office.
Since 2021, investigating judges from the Crimes Against Humanity Unit of the Paris Judicial Court have been probing the command chain that led to the chemical attacks on the nights of August 4-5, 2013, in Adra and Douma in the Damascus countryside, which resulted in 450 injuries at that time, and over 1,000 injuries in Eastern Ghouta on August 21, 2013.
The investigations led to the issuance of four arrest warrants in November 2023 on charges of complicity in crimes against humanity and complicity in war crimes.
In addition to President Assad, the arrest warrants target his brother Maher, the de facto commander of the Fourth Division of the Syrian Army, and two other generals: Ghassan Abbas, the director of Branch 450 of the Syrian Scientific Studies and Research Center, and Bassam Hassan, the strategic affairs advisor to the President and liaison officer between the presidential palace and the research center.
Bashar_al-Assad chemical_attack chemical_weapons syria
