Among many issues the country is facing since the fall of the Assad regime, transitional justice remains a priority. After the bloody history of the Assad family rule, and especially during the past 13 years, it is the right of Syrians to appeal for accountability of the perpetrators of these crimes. This process is still going too slow and it should have its rightful place among the urgent issues.
Transitional justice is a necessary element to guarantee civil peace in Syria. This became clear especially after the deplorable massacres on the Syrian coast. These massacres, along with the hateful discourse that went hand in hand on social media and some Syrian media platforms, reflect the need for accountability as a necessary step to healing wounds, realizing justice, and therefore strengthening security.
The work that Lama Kannout has conducted, Gender-Sensitive Transitional Justice in Syria (2019), is an important resource for understanding the tools of transitional justice through an inclusive lens, especially given the paucity of research in this field within the Syrian context.
(1): I dove into the vast sea of your research that defines transitional justice and how it can be a justice attentive to the perspective of gender/النوع الاجتماعي الحساس Would you please summarize this definition for us within your view and understanding of the Syrian context?
My definition of gender-sensitive transitional justice starts from its common definition, which does not engage in non-militarized oppressive structures like classism and patriarchy. It is necessary to have a definition that emerges from an intersectional feminist lens and is centered around and with the victims in order to universalize the entire concept. This begins with equal participation and broad representation of women in their diversity and diverse contexts; understanding and analyzing the development of their roles and experiences before, during, and after the conflict but also the power dynamics in society and in all institutions, including the family that allows for and facilitates the crimes, violations, and violence in all forms before and during the conflict.
It should also include a map of the violations and their direct and indirect effect on them and on generations in an intersectional way. Therefore, planning for a transformative transitional justice would imply dismantliy authority structures and bringing radical change across pillars such as the knowledge of one’s rights, accountability, reparations, and the reformation of institutions and legislation.
(2): In your research you remind that regime violence didn’t start in 2011, and you suggest including what happened before in any trajectory of transitional justice.
The manifestations of regime violence before the revolution are many. It’s the right of all Syrians to include crimes and violations like the Hama massacres in the 1980s, those committed in prisons like Mezzeh and Tadmor, the 1962 census, and the Kurdish uprising in 2005.
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(3): You emphasize the need not to limit the examination of the regime's violence against female survivors of detention to the question of sexual violence. How is this done? What is the importance of this in the context of promoting gender sensitivity? And how does the involvement of women in the transitional justice process contribute to achieving it?
Because the justice orientations of many organizations working on transitional justice focus solely on sexual violence, including rape. Despite the importance of this, they ignore the wide range of direct and indirect crimes and violations to which women have been and continue to be subjected, and remove the causes that have led and continue to lead to their vulnerability to exploitation and sexual violence, such as impoverishment, forced displacement, camp conditions, the inability to work, and the exploitation of some humanitarian aid workers.
Furthermore, they ignore the sexual violence that affects men and boys. All of this reinforces the public consciousness of women as bodies and/or vessels, and women as objects of honor for the male(s) of the family, meaning they have no independent honor for which they are solely responsible. With the exception of gender experts and feminist organizations working on transitional justice, all the others, usually led by men, do not care about the justice that women and other marginalized groups seek, nor do they care about their views on the map of crimes and violations.
(4) You conducted research while the Assad regime was still in power. At the time, you pointed out that the transitional justice process outlined in Resolution 2254 was flawed, arguing that comprehensive justice could not be achieved without holding war criminals accountable.. Now, with the regime's fall, how do you think it is possible to implement social justice that is inclusive of all groups and sensitive to women's issues?
Transitional justice, if it does not encompass and address the crimes and violations committed by all parties, including the recent crimes and violations committed on the coast, will be incomplete. Just as was the case with the Assad regime previously being a party to Resolution 2254, we now face a challenge related to other parties, including factions operating within the Ministry of Defense. A new Syria cannot be built by ignoring, protecting, or colluding with criminals or people accused of war crimes. We need accountability and reparations for victims. State institutions cannot be reformed without political ‘lustration’ measures (the process through which the past of individuals associated with the previous regime is assessed, N.d.A).
They ignore the wide range of direct and indirect crimes and violations to which women have been and continue to be subjected, and remove the causes that have led and continue to lead to their vulnerability to exploitation and sexual violence, such as impoverishment, forced displacement, camp conditions, the inability to work, and the exploitation of some humanitarian aid workers.
As for the second part of the question; I think that building transformative transitional justice paves the way for building social justice from an intersectional feminist perspective. For example, the framework of reproductive justice intersects with numerous issues and structures like poverty, asylum, displacement, immigration, citizenship, disability, capitalism, patriarchal systems, gender-based violence, domestic and partner violence, environmental justice, authoritarianism and masculinity of the medical establishment, local laws and customs, occupation and colonial inheritance, institutional racial discrimination.
(5): In your research, you’ve spoken about reparations in all its forms – material and moral.
There are multiple forms of reparations —individual, collective, and regional— that have been summarized as restitution, compensation, rehabilitation, satisfaction measures, and guarantees of non-repetition.
Individual reparations can extend, for example, to pensions, educational and training opportunities, access to health services, land, housing, property, and psychological rehabilitation. Collective reparations can include official apologies and other symbolic measures. However, an intersectional feminist lens focuses on examining power relations in order to change discriminatory structures against women and girls across a variety of contexts. My book contains examples of multiple international experiences.
(6): You spoke about the necessity of restructuring state institutions to ensure an end to the injustice rooted in their structure. How can this be achieved given what we are witnessing in Syria, like layoffs of employees and the suspension of salaries for workers?
Restructuring institutions, especially the security and justice sectors, is a preventive measure against the recurrence of crimes and violations. However, the approach taken by the current administration to address corruption and institutional ‘slackness’ is hasty and arbitrary. It is not based on the examination of the files of ‘ghost employees’, or those receiving salaries from more than one government institution.
Many workers, both male and female, were arbitrarily dismissed, and some were placed on forced leave, which plunged them and their families into a cycle of unemployment, impoverishment, and the denial of their rights.
As I argued, a neutral and independent committee must be formed, including legal experts, representatives of trade unions and professional associations, and transitional justice experts, both women and men. The committee should operate at several levels, and its work should later intersect with other transitional justice measures, such as accountability, truth-telling, reparations, and institutional and legislative reform.
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The committee must follow a comprehensive approach through a set of steps, starting with suspending provisions in labor laws that granted privileges to the dissolved Baath Party.
It should examine the records of all employees and identify those who were bogus, and demand reparations from them, or at least from those who can.
It should not make settlements for employees, both men and women, involved in widespread corruption and economic crimes until they are questioned and held accountable. It should work to recover looted public funds. It should investigate employees, both men and women, supported by Baath Party institutions or involved in militias. Perpetrators of crimes and violations should be held accountable, and state employees who are symbols of the former regime and who incited violence or had blood on their hands should be isolated.
(7): How is it possible to guarantee the existence of accountability and organising trials, while this administration operates without transparency, and there is widespread talk about liquidations and revenge?
The new administration has a non-transparent approach when it comes to dealing with perpetrators of economic crimes, war crimes, and human rights violations. This approach is in opposition with the principles of transitional justice and in the end it harms civil peace.
We recently saw scenes of angered people in the district of al Tadamon, after one of the perpetrators of the massacres that took place there appeared.
Only the implementation of an authentic transitional justice process, including the criminalization of hate speech, as stipulated in Article 20 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, can succeed. At the same time, any law in this regard should also be informed by the Rabat Plan, so that it does not infringe upon freedom of expression.
Serious human rights violations on the coast must cease immediately, and the crimes committed must be subject to transitional justice measures. Finally, the security sector cannot be built with the participation of war criminals.
The new administration has a non-transparent approach when it comes to dealing with perpetrators of economic crimes, war crimes, and human rights violations. This approach is in opposition with the principles of transitional justice and in the end it harms civil peace.
(8): Let’s take a moment to discuss the National Dialogue conference, which took place on February 25th. Does it have any relevance to the trajectory of transitional justice?
The Dialogue Conference should be only the beginning to longer and more extensive conversations – not a hastily organised and performative event. The organizers and the preparatory committee were content to issue invitations through a mix of cliques and insiders, There was no any clear and transparent criteria. About 600 people participated. The dialogues lasted several hours, I think around 5 hours, and resulted in non binding advisory, and general outcomes. Moreover, political parties and blocs, professional unions, associations, and civil society organizations, including women’s and feminist ones, were denied from representing themselves.
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As for its outcomes, It made no mention of the importance of holding a foundational national conference that would result in the formation of an elected committee to draft a permanent constitution for the country.
The sixth clause states: 'Preparing a permanent constitution through a constitutional committee that ensures the balance of powers...', still it did not specify the mechanism or the body supposed to be elected by a national conference. The term 'balance of powers' was also used here instead of 'separation of powers'.
Article 10 limited the achievement of transitional justice by holding accountable those responsible for crimes and violations. It did not mention other pillars such as knowing the truth, redressing harm, and reforming institutions and legislation. In the amended version published by SANA, only reform of the judicial system and legislation was added to this clause. The word “democracy” was not mentioned in the outcomes, while the word “citizenship” was added in the version published by SANA. Article 8 incorporated human rights, supporting the role of women, protecting children’s rights, caring for people with special needs, and activating the role of youth in the state and society, while each issue should have been allocated a dedicated item. As for article 10,tThe resolution, which is related to establishing "the principle of citizenship and rejecting all forms of discrimination based on race, religion, or sect," does not include forms of discrimination against women in all their diversity and contexts, as well as marginalized groups, in addition to other points.
(9) What is the importance of women’s participation in transitional justice and the peace processes in the new Syria?
Without the participation of women, with all their diversity and diverse contexts, feminists in particular, justice will be seen solely from a cis-male perspective only. Consequently, the broader gendered impact of crimes and violations will remain invisible, and a transformative approach to transitional justice will be absent. With the exception of sexual violence, the complex array of violence against women and girls, with all its intersections, will not be addressed.
This means that, while violence in the streets and public spaces will be limited, the violence and authoritarianism of patriarchy and other structures of oppression will always be prevalent, in all spaces.
Furthermore, the local civil peace committees and the measures of transformative transitional justice are two paths supporting each other in order to arrive at sustainable peace and national reconciliation.
(10): What is the most important step we need now to achieve transitional justice in Syria? Do you have any recommendations?
Regarding transitional justice, I believe it is essential to create a broad network that includes victims' associations, transitional justice experts (both men and women), and specialised organizations.
We must leverage all diverse competencies, specializations, and skills to assist this process. This network will support and strengthen the transitional justice body that will be formed. However, I am concerned about the mechanism by which the committee will be formed, and whether it will enjoy the necessary independence, or whether the process will be subject to a boiled-down, performative approach, as happened with the national dialogue. The network can play a critical and advisory role and contribute to all of this.
Furthermore, the local civil peace committees and the measures of transformative transitional justice are two paths supporting each other in order to arrive at sustainable peace and national reconciliation.
