Judgment in Hamburg: Ten years in prison for Syrian militia leader – torture for Assad

The Hanseatic Higher Regional Court in Hamburg sentenced a former member of a Syrian government militia to ten years in prison for crimes against humanity and war crimes. As the leader of the Shabiha militia, allied with former ruler Bashar al-Assad, the defendant took part in the mistreatment, torture and enslavement of civilians as well as in looting in Damascus between 2012 and 2015, the verdict said.

Civilians forced to work at the front

The militia was part of the National Defense Forces (NDF). This militia group was supposed to use violence to suppress opposition movements in cooperation with a department of the military intelligence service. The front line in the Syrian civil war ran through the Al-Tadamon district. The NDF had established a “reign of terror” there, said the presiding judge of the State Security Senate, Norbert Sakuth. The defendant had civilians arbitrarily taken away at checkpoints. They had to carry sandbags for government troops, sometimes under life-threatening fire. “The defendant was feared in his district because of his violence and aggressiveness,” said Sakuth.

Chats, videos and 25 witnesses

The court considered the forced labor to be enslavement. According to the presiding judge, several of the victims who testified as witnesses in the trial reported ill-treatment by the defendant. In the district he took advantage of his position to help himself for free in shops owned by intimidated owners. The court heard from 25 witnesses and two experts. Chat histories and video recordings served as evidence. The defendant denied the allegations.

He once transported prisoners in a pickup truck and told them: “We’re going to kill you.” One of the prisoners recognized the defendant and asked him about his daughter. He then released this man as the only one. The released man testified in court as a witness. What happened to the other prisoners is unknown.

Craftsmen hit with plastic pipes

In August or September 2013, a craftsman was tied up and blindfolded and taken to prison. In a cell, the defendant hit him in the face and ordered his subordinates to beat the civilian for hours with plastic pipes. As he fell to the ground, one of the militiamen kicked his head so hard that he hit the wall and suffered a bleeding laceration. The background to the abuse was that the man had demanded money from the defendant’s family for tradesman services. “You want money? – You can forget it,” the militia leader told him and, according to the judge, added: “They will look after him all night.”

Other former residents of Al-Tadamon also testified in court. Almost all of them were afraid of the defendant, explained Sakuth. For their protection, they did not have to provide their personal details during the process. A witness happened to meet the former militia leader again in an asylum center in Bremen and told him that he could not recruit forced laborers here. The defendant then tried to intimidate his relatives in Syria.

According to the court, the defendant entered Germany in February 2016 and applied for asylum. The defendant was arrested in Bremen on August 2nd last year. According to a court spokeswoman, his asylum status was revoked.

Defendant complained about prison conditions

During the trial, the accused denied all allegations and complained about the prison conditions in Germany. The judge warned him: “When we talk about prison conditions, you should think about the people in Syria who were tortured with your help!”

According to the court spokeswoman, the prosecution of war crimes in Syria is possible based on the principle of universal justice. According to this, international crimes can also be prosecuted in countries where they were not committed. The State Security Senate at the Hanseatic Higher Regional Court is also responsible for Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Bremen. The verdict is not yet final.