• Legal & judicial reform

Legal & judicial reform

This report examines the activities of the Supreme State Security Court (SSSC) in Syria set up during the state of emergency in 1963. While the the SSSC was set up to prosecute those it deemed a threat to state security, this paper argues that in practice, the SSSC’s role has been to prosecute those whom the Syrian authorities do not approve of, in trials that lack basic due process guarantees.The report is based on information collected from defendants who have finished serving their sentence, defence lawyers, and foreign diplomats with access to the SSSC courtroom.

The report finds:

• the SSSC consistently ignores claims by defendants that their confessions were extracted under torture and frequently convicts them on vague and broad offences that essentially criminalise freedom of expression and association
• the SSSC exists outside the ordinary criminal justice system and is accountable only to the Minister of Interior, who acts as the delegated martial law governor
• security forces detain defendants scheduled to appear before the SSSC for long periods of time – usually for months – before informing them of the charges against them
• half the cases take at least three years to conclude even though most trials usually consist of four short sessions before the SSSC, often less than 30 minutes long each
• lawyers play a largely ceremonial role during trial - the court and the security services almost always deny them access to their clients prior to trial, and trial proceedings begin before lawyers have had an opportunity to see their client’s file
• the court denies lawyers the opportunity to engage in oral defence on behalf of their clients, allowing them to submit only written defence statements
• defendants have no right to appeal their verdict – SSSC sentences are final by decree, but not enforceable until the President of the Republic ratifies them, however, in practice, the Minister of Interior ratifies the verdicts

The report makes several recommendations, including:

• the scope of violations committed by the SSSC and the Syrian authorities’ enduring refusal to reform it mean that this institution should be dissolved
• defendants facing prosecution solely for their non-violent expression or association should be released
• where there is evidence that a defendant committed recognisable criminal offences, cases should be transferred to regular criminal courts and defendants given a fair trial in accordance with international human rights standards
• the Syrian judiciary should investigate the numerous allegations of torture at the hands of the security services and reject any forced coercions

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