Counter-Terrorism Court in Syria: a Tool for War Crimes

The scope and size of arbitrary arrests of tens of thousands of Syrian citizens and activists have increased since the beginning of the revolution. The records of monitoring and documentation centers show horrifying figures, especially with regard to those killed under torture in detention centers. The massive numbers of arbitrary arrests documented by various Syrian human rights groups have shocked the Syrian and international public opinion. This in turn led to an increase of the number of detainees referred to the so-called Counter-Terrorism Court (CTC).  According to a lawyer who requested anonymity for security reasons, more than 1,200 cases/files were referred to the Counter-Terrorism Court in January 2014 alone.