Inside the Dabbagh Trial #04: The Verdict

TRIAL OF ALI MAMLOUK, JAMIL HASSAN AND ABDEL SALAM MAHMOUD

OR “DABBAGH TRIAL”

Court of Appeal – Paris, France

Hearing Date: May 24, 2024

 CAUTION: Some testimony includes descriptions of torture.

Note that this summary is not a verbatim transcript of the trial; it is merely an unofficial summary of the proceedings.

Throughout this summary, [information located in brackets are notes from our trial monitor] and “information placed in quotes are statements made by the witness, judges or counsel.” The names and identifying information of witnesses have been redacted.

[Note: SJAC continues to provide a summary of the proceedings while redacting certain details to protect witness privacy and to preserve the integrity of the trial.]

Highlights: SJAC’s 4^th trial monitoring report details Day 4 of the trial of Ali Mamlouk, Jamil Hassan and Abdel Salam Mahmoud in Paris, France. On this trial day, the Civil Parties’ lawyers presented their closing arguments, and the Attorney General gave her requisitions. At the end of the day, the Presiding Judge pronounced the verdict of the Court.

Day 04 – May 24, 2024

Closing Argument of Civil Parties’ Counsel Clémence Bectarte

This transcript is based on an exact translation of Clémence Bectarte’s notes for her closing argument and on complements extracted from her pleading before the Court. Passages that she pronounced before the court but did not write in her notes are mentioned in brackets. She expressed most of what she wrote before the Court, but the trial monitor was not able to conduct an exact comparison between the notes and the pleading and, therefore could not extract from the text about what she did not express in Court.

1.       Introduction

It is with great emotion that I address you today, an emotion no doubt commensurate with the honour I have to represent in this case, [and together will Paul Baudouin], Hanane, and Obeida Dabbagh, the Syrian Centre for Media and Freedom of Expression [SCM], and the International Federation for Human Rights [FIDH].

It is a great honor because this fight for justice, in this long journey that has brought us to you today to the holding of this trial, has been marked by great humanity. A humanity full of hope, hope of finding before you a space for justice, as the situation in Syria is characterized by complete and absolute impunity.

It is this feeling of impunity that has led the defendants not to deign appointing counsel. This impunity makes us litigants without adversaries, which we greatly deplore because this quest for justice has always been animated by the deep desire for respecting the right to a fair trial and the rights of the defense, to which the Syrian regime and the three defendants in particular, have always opposed with contempt and complete denial. In Syria, they organized an institutional impunity engraved in its law, which does not allow any hope for justice.

This quest for justice in France has also raised the hope that this humanity would be the response to these crimes suffered by Patrick and Mazen Dabbagh since their arrest on November 3 and 4, 2013. These crimes so well named for which you will try Ali Mamlouk, Jamil Hassan, and Abdel Salam Mahmoud: the crimes against humanity of imprisonment, enforced disappearance, torture, and deliberate attacks on life, as well as the war crimes of extortion and concealment of extortion.

2.       Tribute to the civil parties Obeida and Hanane Dabbagh, and the SCM

I would like to begin by paying tribute to the civil parties I represent.

Obeida and Hanane Dabbagh

To Obeida and Hanane Dabbagh, first of all, whom I have the honor to accompany since 2016 in their fight for justice.

A fight that is marked by their courage – that courage which we do not know how courageous it is until we understand fear – that fear which is instilled in you when you are born a Syrian man or woman, from birth, fear of saying what you think, fear of not being able to claim your rights when they are violated, fear of arbitrariness, of the omnipotence of a repressive state.

How many Syrian families, men, women, and children have been marked by the stories shared on the sly: the massacre at Palmyra prison in 1980, that of Hama in 1982, the ubiquity of the security services, the arrests of unprecedented violence at home, in the street, for no reason, the denunciation established as a system (remember [the expert witness] Mr. Burgat referring to this Syrian expression “the one who writes a report”). So many ghosts that have haunted many Syrian men and women since the accession to power of Hafez Al-Assad and that have been perpetuated under the regime of his son, Bashar Al-Assad. Fear still exists today.

As Caesar said so well during his audition, “In Syria, to think is a crime in itself.”

And then again, the fear, when the worst happens, of not being able to ask, to demand to know if our daughter or our sister, our father, our husband, our son, is alive or dead, simply. To horror, the Syrian regime asks to oppose silence.

It was this deafening silence that Obeida and Hanane wanted to break because they had been dispossessed of everything – of Patrick and Mazen, first of all, of the possibility of asking for news, of knowing what was reproached to them, of getting them out of there, of what they know to be hell. Dispossessed also of knowing whether they are alive or dead, hoping most of the time that they are alive to see them again one day, and hoping sometimes that they are dead so that they do not suffer too much. Dispossessed of their family home. Then dispossessed again of their bodies, of the possibility of burying them, of mourning them.

And I would like to pay tribute to them today, for these reasons, for that courage, which they [said with a certain modesty] how much it has cost them, how much it has isolated them, how hard it has been to make this choice, this courageous choice to file a complaint with the French courts.

For the Dabbagh family, this long journey is also a fight for truth, a judicial truth which you will set out in your verdict and which will be of great importance – that of saying that none of the acts of repression are isolated, that they stem from decisions made at the highest level of the State, and also that of saying that the victims of this savage repression were not terrorists but citizens fighting for their rights, or, again, ordinary citizens caught in the machine of arbitrariness, arrested, tortured and murdered for no reason.

Hanane and Obeida brought this quest for justice before you. To deny the fate of the Syrians. To defy this law of silence and terror.

But before lodging this complaint they naturally turned [to politics], to the French authorities, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Presidency of the Republic, so that the French State could do everything possible to inquire about their fate. All these steps remained a dead letter, and when I met Obeida and Hanane in April 2016, they were helpless but convinced that the path of justice was the only one to take from now on.

Obeida is the one who, with the unwavering support of his wife Hanane and their children, Lynda, Dana, and Sami, and against a part of his entourage, decided that fear must change sides. He decided to trust the French justice because Patrick and Mazzen are French and because he knew he had this chance that so many other Syrian men and women do not have, namely to be able to file a complaint, obtain the opening of an investigation, activate an independent justice and hope to obtain justice.

But his action will go far beyond that because as was explained at length yesterday, Obeida will continue to fight in Damascus in an attempt to obtain evidence and truth about the fate of his brother and nephew.

Hanane would wait until the very last moment of the investigation to register as a civil party because the fear was too great, fear for her, her family and her children.

The SCM

I also have the honor to represent before you the SCM, which was established in 2004 and registered in France under the Associations Act of 1901 because it was banned in Syria, but which remains a Syrian organization.

SCM has done constant work, since its creation and well before the beginning of the Syrian revolution to denounce the violations of human rights of the regime, to assist political prisoners, to continue, relentlessly, and already at the cost of their freedom, to oppose the defense of human rights to the arbitrariness of the regime.

These are the same people who have continued to work since March 2011 to document the crimes and collect the testimonies of the victims, driven by urgency and the conviction that these crimes should be brought to justice.

It was also SCM, together with other members of Syrian civil society, who had the courage to say loud and clear that it was necessary to document all abuses from all parties to what has become an armed conflict and thus to speak out for all Syrian victims. [They continued to work in exile] to provide evidence, to share their knowledge of the structures of the Syrian regime, to gain the trust of witnesses, and this case is a true illustration of that.

Mazen Darwish, I lack words here before you to tell you the infinite respect that I have for him, for his fight, his constancy to continue embodying the fight against impunity. Mazen Darwish, who, like all those Syrian activists who suffered the worst in the regime's jails, chose to respond to the horror [with a fight solely based on Justice, not on revenge. It was necessary to create opponents who would be easier to oppose, so peaceful defenders had to be eliminated.]

But the SCM is also a team of human rights defenders who chose to continue their work in Syria in such dangerous conditions and paid a heavy price for this courageous choice. I would like their names to echo here: Yara Bader, Hani al Zeitani, Mansour Al-Omari, Joan Verso, [name redacted], Bassam Al-Ahmad, Abdel Rahman Hamada, Razan Ghazawi, Mayada Khalil, Sanaa Mehsen, Ayham Ghazzoul, Ritta Dayoub, Shadi Yazbek, Hanadi Zahlot. These human rights defenders were arrested on February 16, 2012 with Mazen Darwish during the raid on SCM's premises in Damascus. One of them, Ayham Ghazzoul, died after being released and then re-arrested by the regime, and his photo is among the Caesar report. Her mother is in the room, and I hope this trial will bring her some comfort.

Similarly, many of those I have just mentioned are in this room, and Mazen Darwish told me yesterday that they had not been gathered in the same room since their detention.

They embody the strength of this Syrian civil society, which, with dignity and courage, has continued to embody the ideals of a revolution based on a peaceful struggle through law and justice. These Syrian human rights defenders, whom I am convinced represent all that Syria could one day become again. This hope they carry with them; I share it fervently.

 All this with the unwavering support of the FIDH, which, since its creation in 1922, has been at the heart of its mandate. The FIDH, a general human rights organization, pledged from 2016 to continue supporting the Dabbagh family in this case, regardless of its outcome and duration. This unwavering support has continued to this day.

And finally, how can we not pay tribute to the dozens of Syrians who testified in this case, directly before investigators and investigating magistrates, or indirectly before the United Nations Commission of Inquiry or before NGOs? All of them testified to the horror, to their suffering, to their experience of telling the stories of torture, of telling the unspeakable, because they had survived, unlike so many others, to ensure that the evidence of crimes against humanity was made accessible, despite the impossibility for magistrates to go to Syria to investigate. Albert Camus so rightly called [it] “the obstinacy of testimony.”

And yet, in this obstinacy of the story, we have touched the unspeakable. Witness W1 told us that he cannot repeat the insults uttered against him by the guardians of Al-Mazzeh, words probably so ignominious that they cannot be said.

This courage is all the more heroic given that the Syrian regime is still in place, that these narratives aim to combat a reality that is still present in Syria, and which has the consequence that fear predominates, for threats of reprisals, and the impossible return to Syria.

In my opinion, it is the power of this extraterritorial justice, the legal possibility that makes you, during a trial, judges of the crimes committed in Syria. I would like you to be convinced, when you leave later, to deliberate. It is not only the provisions of the Criminal Code and Code of Criminal Procedure, which make you the judges of the crimes committed in Syria, but it is also the trust placed in you by these Syrian men and women.

3.       The missing

I would now like to talk about those who have disappeared from this file, whose fate reflects that of tens of thousands of Syrians. Talking about Patrick and Mazen, not to make them reappear, not so that their bodies are returned to their families, this trial can’t bring that, but so that justice is done to them. [The estimations give a figure of 112,000 missing persons, but it's hard to come up with more precise estimation of the missing and dead, as the truth is still concealed].

And remember the words “Get me out of here, I’m suffocating”. These are the last words of Mazen Dabbagh that were brought to the attention of the family. [He uttered these words as he was about to be separated from his son and brother-in-law]. “Get me out of here, I'm suffocating.” Words that don't say much and yet say a lot.

On his personality: [Mazen Dabbagh was the youngest, the only one who choose to stay in Syria and make a life for himself]. Mazen was a senior pedagogical adviser at the French Lycée Charles de Gaulle in Damascus. He was free to think [and very popular among the students. The text read yesterday at the audition reflects what his students thought]. According to Obeida, he had a strong personality that he tempered with an unwavering sense of humor. A strong personality, therefore, who defied the fear of saying what he thought. A man of integrity, upright, but also a loving father.

And then Patrick Dabbagh, a 20-year-old man at the time of his arrest, was described as a reserved young man, of great sweetness, a caring son. I think these were his emerging personality traits, as a second-year Damascus college student, who was not an activist.

As you will have understood, they were anything but terrorists, as the regime claimed about all those detained in its jails. Yet they suffered with the utmost violence the regime’s all-out repressive response. They illustrate that this violence has been indiscriminately and arbitrarily inflicted on the entire Syrian population, allegedly because they were opposed to the regime, considered terrorists, and were in the wrong place at the wrong time, or had been denounced by a relative under torture.

In short, it would be impossible to list all the alleged motives, because they are infinite, because they are precisely intended to spread terror, and because arbitrariness is set up as a system.

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Lastly, I would like to mention the two others who were absent from this trial - FM1 and FM2 [wife and daughter or Mazen Dabbagh]. FM2 who was 16 years old when [her brother and father] were abducted in front of her in her family home. FM1, her mother, saw her only son and then her husband disappear before her eyes. They never wanted, were never able to join the proceedings, testify, become civil parties as they had the right to do.

This fear prevented them, for 6 long years, from going through the door of the investigating judge’s office to come and say, denounce the facts of which their husband, father, son, and brother had been the victims. Because some cannot overcome the fear I was telling you about, they have not been able to do so. We are not here to judge this of course, but maybe we can try to understand them, because it perfectly reflects how great fear is.

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Mr. President, ladies and gentlemen of the Court,

Beyond the facts that you will judge, this case is that of all those who have never been able to file such complaints. As Obeida has always said, he led this fight for his brother, his nephew, and for all the other Syrians men and women who are victims of this persistent impunity. This is also what you will judge – on behalf of these tens, hundreds of thousands of Syrian victims swallowed up by the death machine set up by the regime of Bashar Al-Assad, and in which Ali Mamlouk, Jamil Hassan, and Abdel Salam Mahmoud played a leading role. That is why you are now adjudicating crimes against humanity and not crimes of torture, enforced disappearances, and murder taken in isolation.

4.       The facts

The facts are perfectly established at the end of the file [after 6 years of investigation and 3 days of audience].

On November 3 and 4

The arrest of Patrick. Let us pause on this moment, on its brutality, its extreme violence. It's November 3, a Sunday, during the school holidays. In the evening between 11 pm and midnight, Mazzen, his wife FM1 and their two children Patrick and FM2 are at the family home. It was a Sunday night like any other. That's when three or four soldiers appear, search the house, take the money they find, the phones and computers, and take Patrick with them. [All Syrians know what is going on in these prisons, so we can imagine that they knew what was going to happen to Patrick].

Then, the next day Mazzen was arrested. more men who arrived there again between 23:00 and midnight, who told the father that they will teach him how to educate his son. [Let us stop on these words illustrating total impunity. They have in their hands their 20-year-old son arrested for no reason. These words echo other words heard by Daraa’s families “Forget your children and make others. If you don’t know how, then send us your wives”. This impunity is found in numerous testimonies describing a complete contempt for the victims, which is the first stage in this process of dehumanization.] They took a new car in the garage by assaulting the driver of the Embassy of Cyprus, whose premises are on the ground floor of the family house, and embarked FM3 [Mazen Dabbagh’s brother-in-law], who came to inquire about what was happening.

Imprisonment

We know that they were being held at Al-Mazzeh by the Air Force intelligence services by 6 sets of corroborating circumstantial evidence that prove they were abducted and taken to the center.

1/ The arrest was described in a concordant manner in FM3’s testimony [brother of Mazen Dabbagh’s wife]. [FM3 lived in the opposite building. He came back after two days and is a direct witness. He didn’t directly testify in the file, but his story was echoed by many voices]. What FM3 said corresponds in many ways to what other witnesses said. Many spoke about the rounds in the neighborhood and numerous arrests before being brought to Al-Mazzeh. FM3 reminded standing in a corridor for 15 hours, with his hands tied behind his back [their heads down, forbidden to look at the jailers and at each other, which echoed many stories.] FM3 described Patrick being taken to his father, them speaking in a low voice and Patrick confirming that he had been tortured, what FM3 understood. FM3 was trying to reassure his father. Then they were separated, with the last words pronounced by Mazen “Take me out of here I am suffocating” and FM3 will be released 3 days later.

This story was related in a completely consistent manner via FM1 [Mazen Dabbagh’s wife] to Obeida and Hanane, and FM5 [who was heard during the investigation] and who knows this through FM7 [brother of Mazen Dabbagh], and via FM4 [sister of Mazen Dabbagh’s wife]. FM3 related the story to his sister FM1, who told that to Obeida on the phone. [In this mafia regime, FM3 worked for a businessman. He learnt that the case was being handled by Abdel Salam Mahmoud but could never get them out.]

2/ A brief of the IIIM transmitted to the investigative judge reported geographical distribution between services and we know that the district of Al-Mazzeh where Mazen and Patrick Dabbagh resided is the geographical jurisdiction of the Air Force intelligence services. It is therefore clear that they were taken to that center.

3/ In 2015, an emissary of Abdel Salam Mahmoud contacted the family of FM1 [Mazen Dabbagh’s wife], via FM3 and FM4, and [extorted $15,000 in exchange of information on Mazen and Patrick and a second amount in exchange of their transfer to a central prison]. So, we know that Abdel Salam Mahmoud was responsible for their detention, as head of the investigation branch of the Air Force Intelligence.

At that time, the family already knew that they were there and to give credibility to his racket, so the emissary said that he worked for Abdel Salam Mahmoud. They were condemned to perpetual uncertainty. This illustrates the Economy of Disappearance evoked by [expert witness] Ziad Majed.

4/ Next, it is known that they are held by Air Force Intelligence because the order of seizure came from there. Two documents projected yesterday and commented on by Mazen Darwish were transmitted by Obeida Dabbagh who explained how he was able to obtain them. The first document was a military judgment listing 20 names, among them Mazen and Patrick Dabbagh. The document was notified for information to the Air Force Intelligence. The second document goes further, mentioning the same list again, but on request of the Air Force Intelligence, referring to a very precise and dated ruling of these services. Why don't we find the names of Mazen and Patrick Dabbagh? Because a request had to be made by the Ministry of Finance to identify the properties. These searches showed that Patrick was not the owner, but Mazen was. This certainly explains why Patrick’s name no longer appears.

5/ At the very end of the investigation, the SCM managed to contact one of the persons who appear on the same list as Patrick and Mazen in the alleged case for which they were probably tried and on the basis of which their property was seized. This young man, a minor at the time of his arrest, and still present in Damascus when contacted by the SCM, will confirm that he was detained with Patrick in Al-Mazzeh.

[The SCM made checks on 20 persons on this list which led to a number of observations: at least 10 were convicted and executed, what could be deduced thanks to the work of its Violations Documentation Center on 80,000 testimonies and the contact established with families to confirm the death. On man of the list was an exception, a minor detained with Patrick towards the end of 2013. This victim explained why he remembered the encounter when interrogated at the end of 2021: he never heard the name of Patrick and thought he was a foreigner. It represented a turning point in the case, as it was the first time that we found trace of someone who could identify Patrick in the detention center of Al-Mazzeh despite all previous searches on social networks.] The SCM also provided video of false confessions of some of these detainees.

6/ Then, on November 23, 2021, the investigating magistrate manages to reach FM2 by telephone. [FM2 confirmed “I am afraid, I can’t tell you, I am afraid.” The magistrate asked her if she could only say who arrested her father and brother, and she responded it was the Air Force Intelligence services of Al-Mazzeh].

The imprisonment of Mazzen and Patrick Dabbagh in Al-Mazzeh Detention Center is perfectly established.

Enforced disappearance

Background: this is the first time that this crime is tried in France. Enforced disappearance was established to apprehend a certain type of crime Patrick and Mazen were victims of, to invent words when they do not exist, which is one of the virtues of law, of international criminal law.

The word was coined internationally in 1992, through the United Nations Declaration on the Protection of all Persons from Enforced Disappearance. Then, in 2006, the United Nations Convention on Enforced Disappearance was adopted, incorporated into French legal framework by the Law of August 7, 2013, which introduced this crime as an autonomous offense as well as a constitutive element of crimes against humanity.

[The Syrian regime used this weapon massively. He did not invent enforced disappearance, which were practiced in South America.]

To the ingenuity of the perpetrators, it was necessary to respond with the ingenuity of the law and create, in what has been qualified by Louis Joinet, an eminent French jurist who worked so hard for the adoption of this Declaration, of “legal combat against the theorists of oblivion”, to shape a weapon against oblivion, against impunity.

It is an incrimination that encompasses all of this: suffering, uncertainty, fear, hope and despair. It is a crime committed against a person and all those around him with the aim of terrorizing. What is worse than making a person disappear? Erasing the identity of a person, depriving the family of knowledge of the fate of the person, depriving his family of his body, of the possibility of grieving, depriving of burial.

A crime accompanied by the exploitation of this uncertainty, characterized by attempts to extort relatives - of which the Dabbagh family was the victim like so many other Syrian families. FM4 is approached in 2014 or 2015 from an emissary claiming to work for Abdel Salam Mahmoud, in charge of the detention of Patrick and Mazzen, and will give the sum of $15,000 in the hope of obtaining information.

It is also a crime whose specificity is that the relatives of the disappeared become direct victims of its crimes. What we know, and which is perfectly demonstrated, is that between the evening of November 3 and 4, and at least until the date of issue of the death certificates, the Dabbagh family was voluntarily deprived of any information about the fate of Patrick and Mazzen.

It corresponds to all the characteristics of this heinous crime: arrest, detention, abduction, or any other form of deprivation of liberty, followed by denial of recognition of the deprivation of liberty or concealing of the fate and whereabouts of the disappeared person, exempting him or her from the protection of the law. This is undoubtedly sufficient to consider that they have been victims of enforced disappearances.

The fact that we do not know is not due to an insufficiently thorough investigation, to the impossibility for magistrates to travel to Syria, or insufficient evidence, but because the Syrian regime voluntarily removed Patrick and Mazen Dabbagh from the protection of the law and refused to give any information to the family.

Enforced disappearance condemns Obeida and Hanane Dabbagh to perpetual uncertainty. This is sufficient to consider them victims of enforced disappearance.

Torture

Torture is most certainly the fate of all detainees in Al-Mazzeh, not to say all Syrian detainees.

It is known that on November 4, when Patrick is taken before his father, who has just been arrested, he already bears the stigma of torture. We also know that Mazen will be locked in an overcrowded cell, which will make him utter his last words known to his family, but without knowing the frequency and the way they were tortured.

Its main features were an industrial scale and systematic torture until death. Torture methods were consistently described: flying carpet, tire torture [doulab], power cables, suspensions, sleep deprivation, and sexual abuse of women and men. Also, moral torture: threats, noises of tortured co-detainees, [torture of the son in front of the father], dying people, constant humiliation. Each detainee only has a number left. Overcrowding, lack of water, food, care, or hygiene, diseases, paleness, dysentery, gangrene, wounds treated with scraps of bread, the hospital where you do not want to go because you know that death awaits you there.

Every aspect of daily life in that place was a means of torture, there was not a moment in the course of the day that was not subject to suffering and torture. [What moment is not an act of torture when you are in Al-Mazzeh? What moment cannot be qualified as such under the law?]

Mazen Darwish explained that prior to 2011 torture existed but it was a tool used to extract information. Since 2011, torture has become an end in itself, a tool to kill people, punish, and take revenge. [Expert witness Catherine Marchi Uhel well depicted that some were released to tell their stories, because the regime also wanted this to be known so that the Syrian population as a whole could know exactly how torture is carried out on an industrial scale in Syrian jails.]

The practices in Al-Mazzeh were concordantly described. [I have always had the impression when working on this case to often read the same testimony, even though they were different.] The old and the new prison, which locked up inmates even before the works on the building were completed. Then, the hangars, the gyms, the swimming pool, the studies section, the inner courtyards, a survivor will say, "even the toilets had been turned into cells." 15,000 people detained, 15,000 cries of unspeakable suffering.

What must be understood is that every hour, every second, every moment in Al-Mazzeh is an act of torture within the meaning of the law. The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court describes torture as “the intentional infliction of severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, upon a person in custody or under the control of the accused.”

The very fact of having been detained for even a few hours in Al-Mazzeh is sufficient to characterize the acts of torture, which constitute crimes against humanity, without it being necessary to know every detail of the acts of torture suffered by Patrick and Mazen.

The story of their end of life emerges between the lines of the testimonies we heard during the trial and from many other witnesses of the file. Patrick and Mazen have never been able, will never be able, to come and tell you, to tell their loved ones what they have been subjected to, but we are nevertheless certain, have the proof that they have indeed been subjected to these acts of torture.

Deliberate attempt on life constitutive of a crime against humanity

We do have the ultimate proof of the death of Patrick and Mazen, since the Syrian regime itself provided this proof to the Dabbagh family. [Obeida transmitted the death certificates to the investigative magistrates. We know why they were issued. The Commission of Inquiry on Syria and the IIIM released a specific report on death certificates.] They were issued in a certain context. At the beginning of 2018, the Russian and Iranian governments put pressure on the regime because the Russian army, the Militia Wagner, and the revolutionary guards’ militia were fully engaged on the side of Bashar Al-Assad.

[Bashar Al-Assad hijacked the UN-sponsored peace negotiation process to impose its own peace process called the “Assad process”. There was tremendous pressure on the Syrian regime to provide families with news of these enforced disappearances. So, the Syrian regime decided to respond favorably to this pressure and issued death certificates. It meant “Stop bothering us with this, they are dead now, so please let us move on.”]

The regime issued them as an estimated 82,000 people were missing. [These acts were issued in small numbers compared with the number of deaths in the Syrian jails. The UN Commission of Inquiry estimated the number to be in the tens of thousands. The Syrian regime is convinced that it will never be held to account. We have no evidence to question the fact that Mazen and Patrick died in Syrian jails.]

[There are several reasons to be convinced of their death. First, we know this is an accounting, administrative, and controlling regime that holds this administration of horror, as Caesar shows. Secondly, the number of documents issued by the Syrian regime. [Expert witness] Catherine Marchi Uhel said she had found inscriptions and reports corresponding to the instructions. There is authenticated, detailed evidence that this accounting exists. Furthermore, François Burgat mentioned the Syrian expression of “making his report” to prove one’s loyalty to the regime, to show that the lists of detainees have been properly kept, that the people on the lists have been arrested at a checkpoint, even if there is a risk of making a mistake. This culture of the report was often accompanied by overzealousness. Deaths were undoubtedly registered by the prison administration, and the registry office may indeed have in its possession lists of people who have died in prisons. I also recall the SCM's study on death certificates, which establishes that these people have indeed died. These are precise lists.]

[Mazen Darwish tempered his remarks, mentioning rumors that some people are not dead. These rumors represent hope because we must remember that these lists have never led to the return of bodies. As long as we have this coupon, we still have hope. I'm convinced that FM1 sometimes wakes up at night thinking that her husband and son are still alive. Dana, Obeida and Hanane's daughter, told me a few days ago that every March 29, on Patrick’s birthday, FM2 publishes a post wishing her brother a happy birthday, giving him the news and telling him that she is waiting for him.]

The death certificates issued on August 1, 2018 reported that Patrick died on January 21, 2014 and Mazen on November 25, 2017. I let you imagine the suffering, the distress, the knowledge that they will never recover the bodies, that Patrick and Mazen will be indefinitely deprived of burial, and that all the Dabbagh family will ever have to try mourning are these two pieces of paper issued by the regime.

Needless to say, what the consequence of this was for the Dabbagh family, learning Mazen would have died a year after a judicial inquiry had been opened, realizing that we could not have gotten them out of there. Unlike other death certificates that will systematically mention cardiac arrest or respiratory failure as causes of death, the Dabbagh family has been deprived of knowing how they died and where their bodies are. It is an impossible mourning.

In any case, regardless of the exact date of their death, we have absolute and perfect evidence that Patrick and Mazzen did die and that they were murdered by the Syrian regime. These are indeed crimes against humanity.

All these crimes are not isolated, they are crimes against humanity because they were committed in the context of a widespread and systematic attack against the Syrian civilian population in execution of a concerted plan

The concerted plan

The concerted plan was based on the use by Jamil Hassan and Abdel Salam Mahmoud of the entire Syrian repressive apparatus to implement this policy of all-out repression decided at the highest level of the State. The organized nature of repression resulted in arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances, the use of torture, repression of demonstrations throughout Syria, and, of course, the sheer number of victims.

The systematic and widespread attack

As already considered by the Commission of Inquiry on Syria, the MIII, and the Koblenz Court in sentencing Anwar Raslan to life imprisonment, these acts were indeed committed in the context of an attack considered, although these criteria are not cumulative, as systematic and widespread against the Syrian civilian population.

The extortion and concealing of extortion

The facts of extortion and concealing of extortion are again perfectly proven. Considering first of all the context, extortion was a long-standing practice in Syria since the 1980s. To reward members of the intelligence services, land or non-land property of detained persons was confiscated. It was a common practice during the reign of Assad father and son, a practice which again became widespread from 2011 onward. According to Franck Gellet [former Embassador in the Middle East], the Syrian regime is a mafia, and predation stands at the heart of this system.

For Patrick and Mazen, expropriation took place on July 22, 2016 when FM1 and FM2 were expelled and summoned to the police station [without being allowed to take a small suitcase with them. They do not have bodies, only uncertainties and not even the personal belongings that would have made it possible to accompany them.] A seal was affixed to the house. Following the judgment of the Military Field Court, the house was confiscated for the benefit of the Syrian Arab Republic by its Ministry of Finance, Directorate of Confiscated Property, which issued an order dated July 19, 2016.

Obeida would later learn that the family home was occupied by Abdel Salam Mahmoud, whose name was already familiar to them since, in his name, an intermediary had extracted $15,000 from his sister-in-law in exchange for information about Patrick and Mazzen.

The Dabbagh family will learn about these crimes in two stages in 2018 and 2021.

In 2018, thanks to the intervention of the Dabbagh family in Damascus who were expelled from the family home since July 22, 2016, a document consisting in an order of “precautionary seizure” [asset forfeiture] of Mazzen Dabbagh’s assets by the Ministry of Finance and dated October 22, 2014 (extract from the Syrian land register).

Then, in 2021, Obeida appointed a lawyer in Damascus and managed to obtain the following information:

• A judgment dated January 19, 2014 (date February 20, 2014) stipulated that following the conviction of Patrick and Mazen by exceptional military courts, the confiscation of their movable and immovable property was decided. The judgment [was issued by the General Command of the Army and Armed Forces, and] was notified for information to Air Force intelligence.
• A judgment dated January 29, 2014 that decided confiscation of their movable and immovable property (notified for information to Air Force intelligence headed by Jamil Hassan).
• On February 20, 2014, a decision of asset forfeiture, was issued at the request of the Air Force intelligence (having regard to judgment No 14225 of January 28, 2014 of the Air Force intelligence services concerning the request for confiscation of movable and immovable property belonging to the persons named). This decision concerned about 20 names of persons arbitrarily placed in the same case and referred to court, a common practice since 2011, according to the SCM.            

It can, therefore, be deduced that the goods were seized at the request of Air Force intelligence. This shows that all persons on the list were processed and therefore detained, by the Air Force intelligence services.

In addition, the action brought by Obeida Dabbagh revealed the existence of a tenancy contract drawn up by the Damascus Governorate Public Finance Center to the benefit of the Air Force Intelligence for EUR 30 per year specifying that the premises were intended for residential purposes.

On September 28, 2017, the Directorate of Confiscated and Seized Funds of the Ministry of Finance issued a request for property search. On August 16, 2021, the land register services issued a document entitled “Identification of the property.”

All this information led Obeida and Hanane Dabbagh to think that the seizure of the house was perhaps the reason behind the arrest of Patrick and Mazen, as they went through all uncertainties but were always inhabited by the hope of understanding one day why this violence had unleashed on them.

[This shows the administrative process that preceded and followed the confiscation of the house. The Ministry of Finance requested the seizure, a part of the house was then attributed to the Syrian Arab Republic, then the whole house, and it was lastly attributed to the Air Force intelligence. Abdel Salam Mahmoud himself will occupy this house, as reported to Obeida Dabbagh by many witnesses who were born in this house and in the neighborhood and were still there to relay this information, just as FM1 and FM3 did.]

----------------------------------

As you will have understood, Mr President, Madam President of the Court, the facts of which Patrick and Mazzen Dabbagh were victims are perfectly established by testimonies and corroborating material evidence.

The virtue of this trial is that the incriminations are not only proven but also told so that a judicial truth emerges from these stories which will allow you to consider these offenses proven, against all three accused.

5.       The accused and their responsibility, that of the highest level of the Syrian state              

They are absent, but they had the right and the possibility to attend under the rules of the trial in absentia and, if they did not constitute themselves prisoners, to appoint lawyers. They did not want to use this right.

[You can imagine the number of alleged perpetrators in the chain of command inside prisons and hospitals. We can imagine how many people should be tried. It is a demand I have often found among victims.]

It is essential that justice targets this level of responsibility: those who organized, planned, ordered, orchestrated repression, and mass crimes. The judicial response must be able to target the highest officials

Jamil Hassan

He was named by Obeida Dabbagh at his first hearing by the Central Office for Combating Core International Crimes and Hate Crimes [the OCLCH] on [September 16, 2016] and was also referred to by a large number of survivors of Air Force Intelligence’s detention centers.

He made all his career in the Air Force Intelligence. At the time of Patrick and Mazzen’s arrest and until the death certificates were issued, he was Head of the Air Force Intelligence Service since 2009 and until July 1, 2019 from what CIJA and the IIIM indicate. That was confirmed in the hearings. Jamil Hassan held that position until 2019, when a reshuffle at the head of the intelligence agencies took place and he was replaced by Ghassan Jawdat Ismail.

He was, without a doubt, Head of the Air Force Intelligence when Mazen and Patrick Abdelkader Dabbagh were arrested on November 3, 2013. He was still Head on the official date of Patrick Abdelkader's death on January 21, 2014 and was likely to still have been in office according to the IIIM on the official date of Mazen Dabbagh’s death on November 25, 2017.

As such, he was a member of the National Security Office where he participated in the decision-making on the modalities of repression.

He is a well-known public figure of the Syrian regime, close guard of Bashar Al-Assad, who claimed to have had a leading role in the repression. [Survivors ignore names of jailers, but names of the chiefs are known. Obeida Dabbagh knows that if Patrick and Mazen were at Al-Mazzeh, it was under the responsibility of Jamil Hassan]. In March 2011, Jamil Hassan embodied the hard line of the regime, which was shown in interviews given in November and December 2016. “If we had been tougher from the start, we would not be here today" he said in 2016, referring to Hama and China's crackdown on Tiananmen Square protests.

According to Mazen Darwish, “he was in an essential and fundamental way the one who pushed to go in the direction of violence, torture, the hard method. This was his choice from the very first hour. He was one of the first to rely on religious affiliation considerations in that conflict.”

His individual criminal responsibility is amply proven. It is not a distant leader who would be secluded in an office in Damascus following from far what is happening. He had an active, preponderant role and effective authority, which he exercised on a daily basis over the service he directed.

What the file shows us is that:

• Many victims mentioned his presence in Al-Mazzeh prison. [He         was often seen at Al-Mazzeh detention center even though his Office was located in the Ummayyads Neighborhood [i.e. likely the Ummayyads Square] in Damascus. Mazen Darwish reported to have seeing Jamil Hassan visit the former prison at the Al-Mazzeh airport where he was being held, and that he wanted to be called "master" or "the master" [and said to Mazen Darwish, with the same feeling of impunity, “you try to send us to the Hague”]. According to the IIIM, testimonies indicated that he played a personal role in detentions. Nasser Hamoud's brother personally dealt with him in detention in Al-Mazzeh, when aged 17, after he had just been brutally tortured for days and days.    
• He claims himself, “I installed mechanisms to monitor and control everything” in an interview given to Sputnik News on November 3, 2016.
• The documents from the regime highlight that Jamil Hassan had the power to authorize the detention of individuals and their transfer to the Investigation Branch of the Air Force Intelligence. He also had the power to release prisoners. Similarly, a defector’s testimony indicates that he was kept regularly informed by daily reports sent to him before 10 PM. Other evidence makes it very clear that, as a member of the National Security Office, he was responsible for passing on decisions taken within that body to his subordinates.       
• The same applies to the war crimes for which you judge him. It is his services that asked the Ministry of Finance to proceed with the seizure of the property of Mazen and Patrick Dabbagh.

All these elements lead, without any doubt, to his individual criminal liability on the facts of which he is accused.

Ali Mamlouk

He was head of the Air Force Intelligence Investigation Branch in Al-Mazzeh in the late 1990s, the same functions as Abdel Salam Mahmoud some years later (experiments on chemical weapons detainees in Khan Abu Chammat Detention Centre), with Jamil Hassan as his subordinate. [They were all hardliners, loyal and faithful, and that is why they were able to rise to the top.]

He was then appointed Director of the General Intelligence (State Security) from June 2005 to summer 2012. In 2011, when the revolution broke out, he was still the head of the General Intelligence, responsible for numerous abuses committed against the Syrian population. Two of its members [notably Anwar Raslan] were convicted in Germany during a trial for crimes against humanity that ended in 2021.

Mazen Darwish referred to Ali Mamlouk as “the one who organized the whole intelligence system: he built a security structure in which he placed the men he trusted. This is Bashar’s first circle.”

At the time Patrick and Mazen were arrested, and until the death certificates were issued, Ali Mamlouk was Head of the National Security Office, where he was appointed on July 18, 2012 as a successor to Hisham Bekhtiar [and after the Central Crisis Management Cell was the victim of an attack]. As such, he had de jure and de facto authority over the four intelligence services, including the Air Force. He was the diplomatic face of Syrian intelligence abroad at the time of Patrick and Mazen's arrest. He is today adviser to the President on security matters (since July 1, 2019). [He was at the funeral ceremony this week for the Iranian president.]

Regarding Ali Mamlouk’s role, CIJA documentation of the role and functions of the National Security Office points out a Presidential Decree of June 13, 2009 whose implementation is effective in July 2012. Article 2 of the Decree focuses on mapping and supervising the application of the State’s ad hoc and general security policies and ensuring coordination between security bodies for the implementation of those policies.

In a communication of August 29, 2012, Ali Mamlouk is designated as “one of the main implementers of the policies and decisions adopted by the President and by the National Security Office to suppress dissent by force.” The National Security Office is the decision-making body under the direct authority of Bashar Al-Assad.

He had a role of dissemination of information and provision of precise or general instructions, as showed in a document on December 3, 2013 (Patrick and Mazen had been arrested for a month at that time): “Please pay attention to the health conditions of foreign detainees and detainees of non-Syrian nationality to avoid fatal deterioration. Notify the branch immediately of any death... until we refer the matter to the National Security Office to take the appropriate decision in this regard.” This shows that he knew torture was used on detainees, including foreigners. He does not rule out that some of them will be tortured, but he wishes to be informed because he also embodies the diplomatic face of services abroad. Several documents analyzed by the CIJA showed that Ali Mamlouk, in his capacity, as head of the National Security Office, was aware of the detention of civilians whom he described as "terrorists" in his instructions.

[His responsibility is clear from the documentation of the regime: instructions signed by Ali Mamlouk’s hands to various services are sometimes very precises. He plays an active and preponderant role on a daily basis]

This is the type of authority and control Ali Mamlouk exercises, including, of course, over the Air Force intelligence services. [Because he is Bashar Al-Assad's right-hand man, the four intelligence services are able to carry out this concerted plan. His instructions will be the basis for these schemes, notably the perpetration of crimes against humanity.]

In that capacity, he is also responsible not only for the policy of confiscation of property implemented by the Ministry of Finance at the request of the security and intelligence services, whose action he coordinates but also for all confiscations actually carried out for the benefit of those same services.

Abdel Salam Mahmoud

His reputation has grown since 2011 because he became the head of the largest prison in Syria, the one the United Nations and NGOs agree about that it was distinguished by one of the highest mortality rates.

Abdel Salam Mahmoud was the former director of the Daraa’ section and then promoted to his position of director of the Investigation Branch, at the rank of Brigadier.

At the time Patrick and Mazen were arrested, and until the death certificates were issued, Ali Mamlouk was Head of the National Security Office, Abdel Salam Mahmoud was the Director of the Investigations Branch administering the Al-Mazzeh Detention Centers (reference to the SCM study), while the Special Operations Branch was in charge of repressing protests. The Investigations Branch was described by the IIIM as “the main investigative body of the Air Force Intelligence Service, one of the worst branches of intelligence in torture and execution”. [We will then learn that Abdel Salam Mahmoud was directly in charge of Patrick and Mazen’s detention].

As director of the Investigation Branch, Abdel Salam Mahmoud responded to a perfectly established chain of command, carrying out not only the instructions of his director, Jamil Hassan, but also those of the National Security Office. It is evidenced by a document of the regime, signed by Abdel Salam Mahmoud, in which, on November 4, 2012, he wrote to a military judge in Daraa’, asking him to hand over detained persons, expressly mentioning that he is thus responding to a letter from the National Security Office, the reference and date of which he specifies.

[There has been hesitation, but there is no doubt today about the fact that the Investigation Branch, which administrates all detention centers of Al-Mazzeh]. In its documentation, the IIIM specified that all detentions at Al-Mazzeh airbase fell under the authority of the Investigation Branch. Even detainees interrogated by the Special Operations Branch were interrogated by the Investigation Branch when its prisons were overcrowded. Mazen Darwish confirmed this to you, explaining that there could be confusion given the proximity of the offices of the two branches at Al-Mazzeh airport.

This is also indicated by a Human Rights Watch report dated July 2012, which places Abdel Salam Mahmoud in charge of the complex – i.e., all detention centers located at Al-Mazzeh military airport.

Witness Afad Ahmad, who worked under the orders of Souheil Hassan, Head of the Special Operations Branch, described in this regard a scene in early April 2011 during which he was moved by the massacres committed in Daraa’ and the number of people detained. Souheil Hassan sent him to Abdel Salam Mahmoud’s department to find out the number of prisoners held, and it is this department that gives him the list of prisoners in Daraa’ (approximately 200). It is then Abdel Salam Mahmoud who will supervise his detention and interrogate him.

The IIIM collected testimonies that directly incriminate Abdel Salam Mahmoud as having supervised interrogations of detainees, during which torture was practiced, or as having ordered acts of torture to be committed against detainees, also in his presence. Three detainees incriminate him as having directly participated in torture, according to the IIIM. [One witness even said that his name was on a door in Al-Mazzeh airbase.] Two orders were signed by his hand in July 2011 and November 2012, namely arrest and transfer orders to Al-Mazzeh.

With regard to war crimes, in 2014, Abdel Salam Mahmoud was still in office as it was on his behalf that the sum of USD 15,000 would be extorted from FM4 in exchange for information concerning Patrick and Mazen. [He is the one who sent an emissary to the family to extort money.] Then, in the summer of 2016, after the eviction from the family home, he will live there.

CONCLUSION

Because they ordered, provided instructions, and had the hierarchical power to stop these crimes without having done so, you will have to convict these three senior Syrian officials for complicity in crimes against humanity and war crimes against Patrick and Mazzen Dabbagh.

For they are the ones responsible, beyond the tragic fate of Patrick and Mazen, for the unspeakable suffering suffered by the Syrian civilian population. These are not crimes of the past, they are crimes that are very present, present during these four days of hearings, still present today in Syria.

[The meaning of the sentence will be an immediate sense of justice for the Dabbagh family. I hope this verdict will bring them peace. The sentence will also have meaning for all Syrian victims, who I hope will have the conviction that they have been believed and heard. The sentence will bring justice but also the truth that has been confiscated from the victims by the Syrian regime. This sentence should be read in the light of the verdicts already handed down by the German, Swedish, and Belgian courts as part of this global effort to fight impunity of the regime's crimes against humanity. Justice continues to do its work because this is what the fight against impunity is all about; a long road in which your sentence will be one of the milestones. I say this with all the more conviction because I have always heard these people say to me « we have time, we will still be here to continue to demand justice and the truth ».]

I, therefore, ask you to condemn Ali Mamlouk, Jamil Hassan, and Abdel Salam Mahmoud for complicity in crimes against humanity of imprisonment, enforced disappearances, torture and deliberate attempt on life, and war crimes of extortion and concealing of extortion, to sentences that you will pronounce in accordance with the requisitions of the Public Prosecutor’s Office.

And finally, I would add that it will be justice, an extraterritorial justice, distant or symbolic for some, that will be delivered very far from where it should be delivered, in Syria, a justice that will probably not shake the regime of Bashar Al-Assad in the near future, and that will have little impact on the accused.

But a very real justice for all those who had the courage to testify, to echo this decision so much hoped by the Dabbagh family and through them by hundreds of thousands of Syrians men and women.

Thank you very much

 [Break from 12:01 PM to 12:28 PM]

Closing Argument of Civil Parties’ Council Baudouin

Baudouin opened his argument stressing that crimes are still being committed in Syria while all are reunited in this comfortable room. Baudouin expressed a lot of satisfaction [about the trial taking place] and adopted a meticulous approach to address the case.

This is a historic trial, Baudouin emphasized, because it is part of the history of the fight for universal justice and against impunity. It sets an example for memory against oblivion, for the present and for the future. He stressed it was a fair trial for victims and against persecutors.

Baudouin presented both civil parties.

The French Human Rights League was created for injustice to not go unpunished, considering justice fundamental in a [human] system. The aim was fighting for justice for all.

He related the history of the International Federation for Human Rights [FIDH] and the Human Rights League [LDH], stressing it needed fights to establish universal justice. Consistently throughout history, bicycle thieves have been prosecuted more easily than chiefs. He then mentioned the history and creation of the International Criminal Court and the Pinochet case, with its series of judicial rebounds, that raised awareness on the need for universal and extraterritorial jurisdiction.

In 2005, at the Court of Appeals of the Gard [Southern French department with capital Nimes], a trial against a Mauritanian officer prosecuted for crimes of torture against Mauritanian detainees took place. The officer attended military training in Montpellier. He was not present [at his trial] as he was on tour in Mauritania, but he had a lawyer representing him. There were many obstacles, notably the amnesty law in Mauritania, that did not allow for him to be prosecuted in France. The Court of Cassation issued a ruling that the amnesty law could not prevent trials from being held. The officer was convicted, in what was Baudouin believed, the first universal jurisdiction trial in France.

Then, the National Prosecutor’s Office for Antiterrorism was created. Baudouin mentioned the deadlocks on universal jurisdiction that still represent an issue, like the habitual residence of the person liable to be sued. He stressed the importance of the evolution of universal jurisdiction. In his opinion, this trial proves that it is possible to hold an exemplary trial in the absence of the accused. A just international order can only be achieved through justice.

Baudouin recalled two ongoing proceedings of the Monks of Tiberines and a massacre in Congo Brazzaville at the foot of the presidential place in 1999, in a country where the president is still in office. As we keep our eyes on crimes committed by foreign countries, the threat is always hanging over them, Baudouin argues.

Baudouin found striking the systematic use of torture in the present case and emphasized its extreme sophistication and diversity of the forms of torture. He carried out many fact-finding missions on behalf of the FIDH in countries where torture was commonplace, but in his hearings and reports, he stressed to never have seen such a degree of horror in the multiplicity, systematization, and diversity of torture practices. He said he had been lucky.

[In this case] torture was used as an end in itself; barbarism was taken to the extreme, Baudouin argued. Ziad Majed [CW1] stressed the importance of the prison system, with its “administrative and bureaucratic obsession,” which was one aspect of the horror of this type of regime. The bureaucracy is here to keep records. This shows how deeply implemented and documented the system is. Baudouin then recalled François Burgat [CW2], who explained that one had to climb the towers of violence […] and that torture stood out. Repression was to be carried out in different ways, using the security apparatus to remain one step ahead of the protesters. Garance le Caisne [CW3] described a new concentration camp system where destruction was for destruction's sake. Even when released, the detainees never got out. Memory must be killed, CW3 stated.

Impunity was organized and legalized. [The regime] resorted to the notion of terrorism. We [in France or in the West] also use and abuse this conception, though not to the same extent, Baudouin argued. The notion of terrorism has been hijacked when, in fact, it was state terrorism.

In Baudouin’s opinion, it was the choice of the defendant to not have been represented. They rejected it, and one can only regret not listening to them, at least asking questions on how a human being can reach this level of inhumanity.

This trial was a tremendous step forward, Baudouin emphasized. It shed light on the crimes committed in the past but also helped to remember. It was an opportunity to talk about Syria again. This trial was an important first step, a demonstration of obstinacy to obtain justice, of perseverance. Baudouin quoted Albert Camus.

Baudouin then mentioned another aspect of this trial whose aim was not to punish and repress but also to prevent because as long as impunity remains, people will be encouraged to continue. Baudouin asked why people would stop if there were no risks. He considered it to also be a demand asked of the court and concluded that impunity is a scourge that must be fought relentlessly.

The expected verdict should be commensurate with the gravity of the facts, Baudouin argued. This decision must resonate outside the courtroom and also in the country concerned. Executioners don't like their crimes to be brought to light, but here you have the documentation.

Baudouin saluted with emotion and respect for the people who have come forward as civil parties.

[Proceedings were suspended at 1:07 PM and resumed at 2:35 PM]

******

Requisitions of Attorney General Viguier

Viguier recalled how witnesses described horror and systematic practices of torture. As François Burgat [CW2] said, the regime committed what it accused the opposition of. This trial was the first on Syria, Viguier recalled.

Pursuant to Article 113-7 of the French Criminal Code [which provides that French criminal law is applicable to any crime whose victim is of French nationality], the facts have been referred to the public prosecutor. Viguier stated she was not used to speaking last, in the absence of the defendant, and having no contradiction to provide. She wished the defendants were present and able to respond.

She acknowledged that trials in absentia questioned international criminal justice. During the judicial investigation [information judiciaire] and by sending the defendants' summonses to appear, she stressed the prosecution did its utmost to ensure that they would be informed and could be represented.

Arrest warrants were issued in 2018, and new ones in 2023. Both times, Viguier noted the important media coverage, also in the Middle East, by Arabic-speaking media. Syria still had representatives in international institutions and in France, Viguier added. In 2023, a Syrian representative was appointed to the UNESCO, headquartered in Paris. On May 26, 2011, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs informed the National Security Office of a legal action filed in the USA. Viguier considered it hard to imagine that the issuance of three arrest warrants went completely unnoticed in Damascus, and that they remained in the dark.

The addresses of Jamil Hassan and Ali Mamlouk remained unknown, but Abdel Salam Mahmoud occupied the family house. In order to give the latter every chance of being informed of the trial, Viguier emphasized that the prosecution did not only summon him to appear but sent the summons by international registered letter as well as by simple letter to that address. The family home is still occupied by members [of the Air Force Intelligence], Viguier reminded, and concluded it was highly probable that the defendants were aware of the arrest warrants and the court hearing.

In the proceeding Syria vs. Canada and the Netherlands, the International Court of Justice expressed its regrets that Syria did not take part in the oral proceedings before the court but only sent documents. In the present case, Viguier argued, the high-ranking dignitaries obviously chose to ignore the case as to lessen its importance. She considered it revealed how little they cared about the abuses.

Viguier supported the argument that they could have appointed a lawyer. To the question if the prosecution could have appointed one, she stressed the French Code of Criminal Procedure did not provide for such a decision. She also wondered how a lawyer could have defended them without knowing and meeting them.

Viguier considered trial in absentia did not violate the defendant’s rights. On the contrary, it represented a step forward in the fight against impunity, especially for victims, as Ziad Majed [CW1] emphasized. Trial in absentia was a signal to the defendants and the civil parties. Everything in the power [of the judicial system] has been done to ensure that crimes committed would be punished. If they were arrested, Viguier reminded, a new [first instance] trial would be held and the court’s decision would be null and void.

Viguier paid tribute to the civil parties Obeida and Hanane Dabbagh. They showed perseverance, courage and determination, she said. The mother FM6 died in 2019, and their sons tried to protect her by hiding the truth.

Syrians braved fear, Viguier acknowledged. This term often came back in their mouths, and Garance Le Caisne [CW3] also evoked it. Viguier stressed that one sentence was recurrent; “Walls have ears”. She recalled Ziad Majed [CW1] speaking of the walls of fear, and the many examples given by François Burgat [CW2] about cleaning ladies and sweepers going out before Fridays. Syrians were constantly under surveillance. The Major of the OCLCH also mentioned the fear, which did not disappear once becoming a refugee. Witness Majed [W1] explained that his wife had taken photos and deleted them out of fear. Witness W3 feared that his testimony would have consequences for his brother who remained in Syria.

Mazen and Patrick Dabbagh were victims of the same acts as tens of thousands of Syrians, which was part of a widespread and systematic attacks as provided for in Article 212-1 of the French Criminal Code. Viguier also recalled that facts constituted war crimes considering the context in which they were committed.

Immunities

Attorney General Viguier addressed the principle of immunity of which the defendants could have availed themselves. The principle of immunity ratione personae was not applicable in that case, Viguier reminded, because none of the three defendants could claim personal immunity linked to their positions as President, Prime Minister, or Minister of Foreign Affairs. She then addressed the immunity ratione materia for agents of a State participating in the exercise of its sovereignty, reminding that no conventional basis existed for this principle of customary international law. She concluded on the relativity of this principle.

On January 13, 2023, the Court of Cassation opened the possibility of setting aside the application of these immunities in a ruling on Guantanamo. It is the responsibility of the international community, Viguier affirmed, to put limits to this principle. She said one had to admit that the present facts, [crimes against humanity] that are the most serious in our legal system and war crimes, were in no way comparable to the acts of torture referred to in the Court of Cassation’s ruling. The context and purpose of these acts was violent repression, and their scale and systematic and widespread character was specific. Viguier also outlined the profiles of victims who were citizens, men, women and children.

Viguier discussed foreign case law. In her opinion, the international community seemed not to consider it acceptable to grant immunity to international crimes. Courts in Israel, the United Kingdom, etc., affirmed that these crimes could not be considered acts of sovereignty because of their seriousness. In the Pinochet case, the House of Lords in the United Kingdom ruled that torture was not an act of sovereignty, stressing it was not acceptable from a state. Viguier also recalled the Eichman ruling on May 29, 1962 in an Israeli court that considered the acts in question were not sovereign acts. On March 11, 2004, the Italian Cour of Cassation determined that no immunity applied for international crimes. The Supreme Court of [country inaudible] followed this interpretation. On February 21, 2024, the German Federal Court established that immunity of public officials did not apply to international crimes, irrespective of the status and rank of the perpetrators. As [first name redacted - last name inaudible] said in his audition in 2019, the UN Commission on International Law adopted on its first reading a resolution draft on international law standards.

It went without saying, Viguier argued, that if the court applied immunity ratione materia in this case, international crimes would always go unpunished. She mentioned the audition of [name redacted] on December 7, 2022 who noted the trend of dismissing immunities for international crimes. Viguier argued that because of immunity, victims of such crimes could not bring their case before any judge, since they have no access to justice in their country of origin, nor would they be able to bring their case before a foreign state. Attorney General Viguier asked the court to hold that the defendants do not enjoy immunity for the facts.

Facts and Context

Viguier relayed Syria’s history, starting with Hafez Al-Assad, who accessed power in 1971 and exercised absolute power until his death. He manifested it in unprecedented violence, particularly in the prison of Palmyra and during the Hama massacre. The power shifted from the Baath party to the intelligence services following Hama, the party having failed to anticipate the revolt. The importance of the intelligence services grew, particularly the Air Force Intelligence, as Hafez Al-Assad himself had been one of its members. Viguier last mentioned confessionalism.

After Bashar Al-Assad came to power in 2000, hopes quickly extinguished. Demonstrations started in 2011, and the Syrian regime employed a double language, used the term “terrorism,” and multiplied its atrocities. Arrests took place during demonstrations and raids on homes, at workplaces and checkpoints. A sense of impunity spread, Viguier depicted. The present facts took place in this context.

Viguier regretted that three direct witnesses were not heard during the instruction, namely FM1, FM2 and FM3. Only on November 23, the investigative magistrate had a conversation with FM2 who confirmed that the Al-Mazzeh Air Force Intelligence Branch was behind the arrest.

The story of the arrest was reported by Obeida and Hanane Dabbagh as follows: on November 3, 2013, for still obscure reasons, Patrick Dabbagh was arrested [Viguier then relayed the course of events as described in the indictment]. On November 6, 2013, FM3 was released, and since then the family had no more information about the victims until August 1, 2018 when they received death certificates. The certificates stated that Patrick Dabbagh died on January 21, 2014 and Mazen Dabbagh on November 25, 2017 and did not mention place or cause of death. The bodies were not handed over and the place of burial was not specified, Viguier pointed out.

In July 2016, the Dabbagh family was evicted from their home. After that, they discovered a judgment dated January 19, 2014, two days before the official death of Mazen Dabbagh, that ordered seizure of movable and immovable property. The judgment was notified to the Ministry of Finances and shared, for information, in the first place to the Air Force Intelligence, second place to the Ministry of Interior, and finally, the Military Court. The Ministry of Finances executed the decision on the same day. On August 16, 2021, the land registry mentioned that the Syrian Arab Republic was now the owner. Thanks to this observation by Obeida Dabbagh, it became clear that the Air Force Intelligence now had a rental contract for the premises.

The place became unbearable for other inhabitants due to threats from Air Force Intelligence residents. Abdel Salam Mahmoud left in [year unclear]. Mohamed Ziad and Mahmoud Ismail still lived there.

Legal characterization of the facts

Crimes against humanity

Article 212-1 defines a crime against humanity and lists 11 subjacent acts, among them 4 are retained: imprisonment, torture, enforced disappearance, and willful bodily harm.

Viguier detailed the contextual element.

• The concerted plan is a concept stemming from the Military Tribunal of Nuremberg [who used the term] “conspiracy.” There is no need to detail the precise course of the crimes. The 8 French criminal courts that had to rule on this matter all deduced crimes against humanity from the very circumstances in which they were committed.

In the present case, the context was characterized by the regime's disproportionate resort to violence, a methodically organized use of torture by the secret services through special techniques, and degrading and humiliating acts committed on an industrial scale. Viguier added an involvement of all levels of the state in surveillance and repression, without need for motives, which was a policy applied in each governorate by the 4 intelligence services and methodically, bureaucratically and administratively organized as demonstrated in the Caesar file and in testimonies. Attorney General Viguier considered the concerted plan to be fully characterized.

• The widespread and systematic attack against a civilian population was the other contextual element [required to characterize a crime against humanity]. Viguier first depicted an abundant international jurisprudence. To the International Criminal Court, [a widespread and systematic attack] was a behavior consisting of multiple acts, an attack on a certain scale. The notion of “widespread” attack meant it occurred on a large scale and caused multiple victims but could also consist in a single large-scale act. 

The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) considered that a widespread attack was characterized by being directed at multiple victims. Its systematic character implied a certain degree of organization and the improbability of its fortuitousness.

To the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), the systematic character was implied in a carefully planned act that followed a regular pattern and was the result of a concerted policy. The ICTR did not require the policy to be officially adopted [to uphold the systematic character].

Viguier then addresses the notion of targeting a civilian population. To the ICTR, the civilian population was limited to people who did not participate in hostilities, including defectors.

Viguier affirmed that the [crimes committed by the] Syrian authorities were almost a textbook case of what constitutes a crime against humanity. The regime's violence has been monstrous. It was difficult to know the number of victims, but the Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR) estimated 215,000 Syrian citizens had been arrested, among them 80,000 were missing, 200,000 died and ten thousand were wounded.               

To Viguier, the civilian quality of these people was unquestionable: they were men, women, children, elderly, disabled people. The scale of casualties and raids on civilians was also an element that characterized the widespread and systematic attack, the best proof being the Caesar file.         

Several organizations have qualified the repression as a crime against humanity. The Commission of Investigation on Syria argued in August 2012 there were reasons to believe that the acts had been committed as part of a widespread attack. To the CIJA, they constituted crimes against humanity of imprisonment, inhumane treatment, etc. because of their severity, nature and scope. The victims were civilian populations.                           

These crimes resulted from the regime's policy of repressing dissent, Viguier stated. Centralized supervision and coordination were ensured at the highest level of the regime. In addition to international organizations, German courts have pronounced themselves and retained the qualification of crimes against humanity, such as the Highest Court of Koblenz on February 24, 2021, that spoke of a widespread and systematic attack.          

The facts

Viguier addressed the facts the Dabbagh were victims of. The indictment covered the period between November 3, 2013 and August 1, 2018, date of the death certificate. The facts of which they were victims necessarily fell within the context evoked earlier, Viguier introduced.

Several hypotheses were made about their arrest. Viguier doubted that no one would ever know more about that night. But [the multiple explanations] was indifferent to the characterization of the crimes, Viguier argued. On the contrary, it proved their arbitrary nature.

Imprisonment as crime against humanity

Viguier explained that international case law referred to three elements to prove imprisonment [as a crime against humanity]: deprivation of liberty, arbitrarily imposed incarceration without legal basis, and intent of arbitrary deprivation. Everyone wondered if they met a judge during that period. Viguier asked the court to hold that they were victims of imprisonment in violation of the provisions of international law that constitutes a crime against humanity.

Torture as crime against humanity

Viguier reminded that Article 222-1 of the French Criminal Code do not define acts of torture. She referred to Article 7-2E of the Rome Statute, which gives a definition. In national and international case law, torture consists of inflicting severe physical or moral pain or suffering.

The acts committed could undeniably be qualified as acts of torture. Viguier made her conviction that Mazen and Patrick Dabbagh were tortured based on the testimony of FM3 who heard his nephew, saw him bearing traces [of torture], and heard Mazen calling “I am suffocating”. Viguier also mentioned its widespread and systematic use in detention centers, where it was almost impossible not to be tortured. As a defector depicted, in August 2011: “I could not even remain seated in my office because of the sounds of torture”. The imagination of the perpetrators appeared limitless. The pattern was recounted by almost all victims who were interviewed. Releases occurring after a random hearing before the judge remained unexplained.

Viguier mentioned the discussion on the possibility of not having endured torture. Catherine Marchi Uhel [CW4] explained that only a very small number of witnesses did not mention torture, and these were short interviews. Mazen Darwish [CP3] related that just knowing they were being transferred to Al-Mazzeh was torture. If one assumed they were not tortured, Viguier claimed that the fact they were detained there gave the conviction that they experienced detention conditions equivalent to torture, such as disease, overcrowding, etc. She stressed that detention conditions were in themselves acts of torture.

Viguier asked the court to hold that they were victims of the crime against humanity of torture.

Enforced disappearance as crime against humanity

Article 221-12 of the French criminal code outlines the three elements that characterize an unforced disappearance: deprivation of liberty, subtraction to the protection of the law, and refusal to disclose the fate of the person. The perpetrator must act as an agent of the State or with the consent of the State authorities. Viguier stressed that the Dabbagh were detained in secret and in defiance of the law’s protection, without being brought before a judge. The death certificates did not give an indication of a place [where they were detained]. Viguier concluded that these elements characterized an unforced disappearance constitutive of a crime against humanity.

Deliberate attempt on life as crime against humanity

The death certificates are the elements that enable reference to Article 221-1 of the French Criminal Code, Viguier argued. Addressing the reliability of the document, Viguier reminded Mazen Darwish’s indications that these certificates corresponded to reality [of the deaths] and were issued in order to regulate the regime's practices. Viguier considered the handing over of these certificates a recognition [of the crimes committed]. To Viguier, the mass graves and the Caesar Files also demonstrated the obvious will to kill. She quoted a witness who was heard by the investigative magistrates and said that the Air Force Intelligence was a famous place [rest inaudible]. Viguier asked the court to retain the crime against humanity of deliberate attempt on life.

War crimes

As outlined in the indictment, the facts extended from the judgment dated January 19, 2014 to 2018. Article 461-16 CP punishes extortion and the concealment of extortion. The precondition for this offence is the existence of an armed conflict. Viguier argued that the Syrian context was particularly challenging since 2011. Armed resistance groups formed in certain regions what led to militarization of the uprising. The Free Syrian Army was created in early July 2011. On February 15, 2012, armed violence gained intensity. For the Commission of Inquiry on Syria, the situation shifted to an international armed conflict in August 2012. The Commission also emphasized the intensity and duration of the conflict. The IIIM dated the beginning of the conflict a few months earlier, in December 2011. Regardless of the date when the conflict began, the expulsion took place in 2016 while the non-international armed conflict was underway.

Extortion is provided for in Article 312-1 of the French Criminal Code and the concealment [recel] in Article 321-1. Since the judicial system was corrupt and judges had no room for maneuver, Viguier asserted the court rulings were merely the judicial veneer of an Air Force Intelligence’s decision. Judgment of January 19, 2014 was notified to the Air Force Intelligence. Justice was solely a tool of constraint to obtain the undue handing-over of the apartment. The way the Dabbagh family was evicted was akin to violent expulsion, Viguier argued, and the low rental price (20 to 30 dollars a year) was tantamount to spoliation.

Viguier stressed that these facts took place in the context of a non-international armed conflict. She mentioned law No. 10 promulgated on April 1, 2018 [by the Syrian regime] that had the effect of depriving millions of Syrians from asserting their ownership titles.

As the same individual could not be the perpetrator of extortion and conceal the same property, Viguier asked that only the first extortion be retained, and not the concealment of stolen goods.

Liabilities

The Air Force Intelligence was implicated in the crimes, Viguier asserted. Its responsibility was indisputable. Viguier |recalled the evidence] and mentioned the telephone contact the SCM had with an underaged detainee who met Patrick Dabbagh [in custody]. The investigation attempted to trace the chain of responsibility and identify the three defendants.

Ali Mamlouk

Ali Mamlouk is, today, a special advisor. He is far from being in disgrace, Viguier argued. He headed the General Intelligence Directorate from June 2005 and was appointed head of the National Security Office in 2011 where he stayed until 2015 according to the IIIM, and until 2019 according to the CIJA. Mazen Darwish pointed out that in 2015, he was still head of the Office. Ali Mamlouk went to Egypt as head of the National Security Office in late 2018 or early 2019. That corresponded to the temporal scope of the investigation (“dates de prévention”).

The role of this National Security Office was fully documented in the procedure, Viguier stated. It acted as a coordinator according to legislative decree No. 36 of 2009. This office reported to Bashar Al-Assad and had the power to give instructions to the intelligence services. Several documents signed by Ali Mamlouk demonstrated his role. He asked to be informed of the death of non-Syrian detainees, Viguier recalled.

Viguier recalled François Burgat [CW2] describing Ali Mamlouk as the one who knew everything. Viguier considered there was every reason to believe that when it came to Franco-Syrian detainees, he was informed. Former Ambassador M. Chevalier described him as a tough character, as well as Mr. Chaban, indicted while under investigation [mis en examen] in another procedure.

To Viguier, Ali Mamlouk aided and abetted crimes against humanity and war crimes. He gave orders, coordinated services, and let services under his authority act while he was aware [of what they committed]. In that sense, Viguier argued, he allowed the acts to be committed. She asked the court to convict him of these facts.

Jamil Hassan

Under the authority of Ali Mamlouk was the Air Force Intelligence, headed by Jamil Hassan, who previously operated as Special Secretary to Ali Mamlouk. The period during which Jamil Hassan was in office varied according to sources. The consensus was that he took office in 2009. There are discrepancies on the date of his departure; 2017 according to the CIJA and 2019 according to the IIIM. In 2019, he was replaced by Ghassan Ismael.

Official documents and testimonies shared by the CIJA showed Hassan’s omnipotence in the Air Force Intelligence. He received daily reports before 10 pm and notes signed by his hand were added to the proceedings. He had the power of ordering the transfer of detainees to the Investigation [or Inquiry] Branch and ordering torture to continue or detainees to be released. He presented himself when he received detainees. Many defectors mentioned him, explaining that he was nicknamed “the chief.”

Viguier then referred to the audition of witness [name redacted] by the investigative magistrates who relayed his encounter with Jamil Hassan and quoted his words “you are there in the arena of the Air Force Intelligence and in front of General Jamil Hassan. If you deny and if you lie, I will end your life.” Viguier mentioned another defector who called Jamil Hassan a blood-thirsty criminal.

Viguier reminded the court Jamil Hassan’s interview with Sputnik where he admitted he was cruel when it came to his country and ready to kill one million people before been brought to the Hague.

To Viguier, Jamil Hassan aided and abetted crimes against humanity and war crimes by giving orders, let things happen, and kept Mazen and Patrick Dabbagh in detention until they died. The Air Force Intelligence was the service at the origin of this procedure, Viguier outlined. She asked the court to convict him of the counts of crimes against humanity and war crimes.

Abdel Salam Mahmoud

He arguably directed the Investigation Branch of the Air Force Intelligence before March 2011, and at least since March 2012. Mazen Darwish indicated he remained in function until 2015, but there was no publication in the official journal and opacity reigned. But Viguier mentioned evidence that he remained in office:

• On June 7, 2018, he appeared in the list of personalities targeted by French sanctions [Order of June 7, 2018 implementing the sanctions regime provided for in the Monetary and Financial Code of the French Ministry of the Economy and Finance];
• He used an intermediary to extort 15,000 dollars [to the family Dabbagh];
• A defector, former member of the Air Force Intelligence, stated Abdel Salam Mahmoud told him one could make a lot of money thanks to the smuggling at the airport, and he should not ruin his chances.

Viguier concluded there were sufficient elements to determine that he was in charge of the Air Force Intelligence during the temporal scope of the investigation (“dates de prévention”).

Several witnesses mentioned his role, stressing that he gave orders to torture [detainees]. Abdel Salam Mahmoud was described as particularly cruel, efficient, bitter, and violent, his service turning into a butchery. A witness said he gave orders to mistreat prisoners, in particular to break their bones. Another witness relayed he volunteered for the Air Force Intelligence and was a hateful and criminal Shiite whose hatred increased with the events. This witness also described Mahmoud as very obedient to commands.

Viguier admitted she had no evidence to suggest that he himself committed these acts and stressed Abdel Salam Mahmoud had a role of an accomplice of crimes against humanity and war crimes in provoking and giving instructions as a hierarchical superior without taking measures in his power to repress the acts committed. She asked the court for a conviction.

The sentence

Viguier first argued that the context did not erase the singularity of the victims. The crimes against humanity they have been victims of reflected the singularity of their person, but also their belonging to a human community in the context of a systemic attack. Far from dissociating themselves from the acts, the defendants were at their origin, Viguier emphasized. They were part of the mass repression system.

Viguier asked the court to sentence the defendant to life imprisonment and to maintain the effects of the arrest warrants.

***

Presiding Judge Raviot explained that the Assize Court judging crimes against humanity was an ordinary court, which meant that the Court would now retire to deliberate on whether, in the terms of the indictment, the defendants were guilty. Judge Raviot reminded the audience that the court could only base its decision on the debates and the indictment, and not on the judicial file which won’t be at its disposal during deliberation. Judge Raviot ensured the Court would render its decision immediately after deliberation. Judge Raviot read out Article 353 of the French Code of Criminal Procedure:

"Sous réserve de l'exigence de motivation de la décision, la loi ne demande pas compte à chacun des juges et jurés composant la cour d'assises des moyens par lesquels ils se sont convaincus, elle ne leur prescrit pas de règles desquelles ils doivent faire particulièrement dépendre la plénitude et la suffisance d'une preuve ; elle leur prescrit de s'interroger eux-mêmes dans le silence et le recueillement et de chercher, dans la sincérité de leur conscience, quelle impression ont faite, sur leur raison, les preuves rapportées contre l'accusé, et les moyens de sa défense. La loi ne leur fait que cette seule question, qui renferme toute la mesure de leurs devoirs : " Avez-vous une intime conviction? "

“Subject to the requirement that the decision be reasoned, the law does not require each of the judges and jurors making up the Assize Court to give an account of the means by which they have convinced themselves, nor does it prescribe any rules on which they must make the fullness and sufficiency of a piece of evidence particularly dependent; it requires them to question themselves in silence and meditation, and to seek, in the sincerity of their conscience, what impression the evidence brought against the accused and the means of his defense, have made on their reason. The law only requires them to ask this one question, which contains the full extent of their duties: “Do you have a deep conviction?”

 [Proceedings were suspended at 4:03 PM and resumed at 7:54 PM]

******

 Verdict

[Proceedings resumed at 7:54 PM]

Presiding Judge Raviot, Judge Simeoni and Judge De Mauléon entered the court. They all remained standing while Judge Raviot pronounced the sentence.

The court declared Ali Mamlouk, Jamil Hassan, and Abdel Salam Mahmoud guilty of complicity in crimes against humanity committed in Damascus, Syria, between November 3, 2013, and August 1, 2018 (date of delivery of death certificates to the family). In the context of a widespread or systematic attack and the execution of a concerted plan against a civilian population, namely Syrian civilians identified by the regime as opponents and their family members, the three Defendants indeed made themselves accomplices to the following acts constitutive of crimes against humanity:

• Imprisonment or any other form of severe deprivation of physical liberty in violation of fundamental provisions of international law
• Torture
• Enforced disappearances
• Willful attacks on life

To the detriment of Mazzen Dabbagh and Patrick Abdelkader Dabbagh.

The Court declared all three defendants guilty of the war crime of extortion committed in Syria from January 19, 2014 to October 9, 2018 on the real estate property of Mazzen Dabbagh which seizure and confiscation were obtained following his imprisonment, torture, enforced disappearance, and death.

Those acts were committed against an individual protected by international law in armed conflicts and were not justified by military necessities. Therefore, they constitute a war crime.

The court acquitted all three defendants of the war crime of concealment of extortion, considering that those facts were encased in extortion.

The court convicted all three accused to life imprisonment and ordered the maintenance of the effects of the arrest warrants issued against them on March 29, 2023.

Even if they are not present, Judge Raviot stressed, the defendants are now convicted according to the in abstentia procedure and can oppose this decision. In this case, the present decision would be deemed null and void.

The decision will be made available to the parties on Wednesday, May 29, 2024 at 2 PM in application of the provisions of Article 355-1 of the Code of Criminal Procedure which allows for the possibility of a deferred reasoning due to complexity of the case regarding the nature of the crimes committed.

---

Judge Raviot stated there would be no civil audience. Counsel Bectarte inquired about the possibility of referral requests. Judge Raviot said he had no date to propose since he would not sit in Paris in an ordinary panel in the coming weeks.

[Proceedings were closed at 8 PM]

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