UN investigator states accountability for Syria’s human rights violations is closer than ever

(MENAFN) A top UN investigator said on Tuesday that a new opportunity to access evidence of human rights violations in Syria has brought accountability "closer than ever" since the fall of the Assad regime, although preserving evidence remains crucial.

Robert Petit, head of the International, Impartial, and Independent Mechanism (IIIM), which investigates serious crimes in Syria, told reporters in Geneva that the current situation offers "new opportunities" as an "interlocking series of crime scenes" across the country are now accessible.

"There is now the possibility of accessing evidence of the highest level of regime and allied crimes responsibility," Petit stated. "There's also now, as we've seen, the very poignant image, the possibility to finally establish the fate of tens of thousands of Syrians who were illegally arrested and detained and suffered for some of them, years of violence inside the prison system, which we have documented."

The IIIM, established by the UN General Assembly in 2016, is responsible for collecting, preserving, and analyzing evidence to assist in investigations into war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide committed in Syria since March 2011.

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