A Plea From The Syrian Civil Community and Human Rights Activists

March 9th, 2018

To the Distinguished Representatives:

Secretary-General of the United Nations: Antonio Guterres
International Envoy to Syria: Stephane de Mistura
EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy: Federica Mujerini
Secretary-General of the Arab League: Ahmed Aboul Gheit
Chairman of the African Union Commission: Moussa Faki
Secretary-General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation: Yousef bin Ahmed Al-Othaimeen
Secretary General of the Arab Parliament: Mish’al Bin Fahad Al-Salmi

State and Militia Terrorism is Targeting Ghouta and the Whole of Syria

IT MUST BE STOPPED

Before Ghouta Is Turned Into the Tomb of UN and Human Conscience

 The famed civil rights leader Martin Luther King once warned humanity that: “We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people.” So it is that your silence and your lack of response to the continuation of the Syrian humanitarian crisis will eventually lead, as the philosopher Noam Chomsky predicted, to the birth of a more dangerous monster than ISIS.

As the pace of fighting and killing in Syria accelerates with bloody consequences, the role of the international community has mysteriously, and contrary to expectations, regressed. The effective functioning and the resolutions of the United Nations have been disabled by the non-compliance of the Syrian regime and its supporters.

The regime and its supporters have not complied with the alleged “truce”, just as they have never complied with any such agreements before. On the contrary, they have developed a policy of brutalization by targeting Eastern Ghouta with warplanes, cluster bombs, explosive barrels and poisonous gases, while at same time the regime expands the bombing circle and aggression on the entire Syrian territory.

For the last seven years the Syrian regime and its allies (Iran, Russia, Hezbollah, in addition to Iraqi, Iranian and other sectarian militias) have justified their crimes against our people and country under the pretext of fighting terrorism. This pretext has succeeded in preventing the international community from intervening and shouldering responsibility for the protection of civilians in compliance with security council resolution 1674 /2006, as well as the Responsibility to Protect (R2p) Principle which was endorsed by all member states of the United Nations at the 2005 World Summit to prevent genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleaning and crimes against humanity.

The UN members agreed that the R2p Principle would be a formal obligation based on three pillars: the responsibility of each state to protect its population (pillar I); the responsibility of the international community to assist countries to protect their populations (pillar II); and the responsibility of the international community to protect when the country fails clearly to deliver a timely and decisive response to protect its population (pillar III).

In September 2017, in his remarks to the United Nations General Assembly informal dialogue on the responsibility to protect, the Secretary General António Guterres confirmed that “should national authorities manifestly fail to protect their populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity, then we must be prepared to take collective action, in accordance with the Charter, including Chapter VII, on a case-by-case basis.” He concluded his remarks stressing that “It is time to move beyond the conceptual debate towards improved protection of people from atrocity crimes.”

A few days ago on 26 February, the Jordanian Prince and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Prince Zeid Raad Zeid al-Hussein, said: “Syria must be referred to the International Criminal Court.” On 24 February , the Security Council, acting unanimously, adopted a resolution demanding the cessation of hostilities in Eastern Ghouta and in the whole of Syria without delay for at least 30 consecutive days, ensuring a “durable humanitarian pause” to enable weekly humanitarian aid deliveries and medical evacuations of the critically sick and wounded.

In spite of local and global demands and condemnations, Ghouta is under siege, populated areas are being targeted and civilians are being killed, all under the pretext of fighting terrorism, while all the world is well aware that the location and actions of the said terrorists are not in the targeted populated areas. Instead, this is just a dirty and cynical ploy by the regime and its supporters to force inhabitants to flee in preparation for complete demographic change in Syria, as has already been seen in Aleppo, Homs, Zabadani, Dariya, Quosair, etc.

Syrians are witnessing the massacre of our people, under international and official disability and in the face of the United Nations’ reluctance to issue any resolution obliging Russia and the Syrian regime to stop these abuses. The regime is blatantly circumventing the international community and ignoring UN resolutions in its use of chemical weapons,  it is preventing the United Nations from providing medicines and medical equipment to the victims and is stealing most of the food aid intended for civilians.

We, the undersigned, are a wide representation of Syrian civil society. We call on the international community represented by the General Assembly of the United Nations, and on all secretaries of the international and regional organizations, including the Arab league, to act immediately to issue a binding decision to achieve the following:

1. To force an immediate cease-fire and a dispatch of international observers to all areas of combat in Syria. Such a plan should include an accurate implementation mechanism to avoid repeating the tragedy of forcible evacuation of civilians and to spare their areas from being handed over to hostile militias or to the regime (as was the case in implementing resolution 2328 for the city of Aleppo), and to prohibit using the pretext of “fighting terrorism” in bombing populated cities and areas (as is the case now in implementing resolution 2401). We also point out that, since the Security Council has been held hostage by a permanent member (Russia) who is a key partner and vital supporter of the regime in the continuation of the Syrian holocaust, it is not acceptable to wait until the permanent members of the Security Council reach concord on saving the Syrian people and their country.
2. To ensure safe return of all refugees and displaced persons and give the people the right to demonstrate and organize sit-ins and protests in the presence of free media to express their opinions without repression or threats.
3. To de-legitimize the Syrian regime, which has not only persisted in its war of genocide against the Syrian people, but is still deceiving the international community and flagrantly violates the resolutions of the United Nations.
4. To release all detainees and provide records on those whose fate is unknown.
5. To refer the Syrian file to the International Criminal Court.

With regard to a political solution in Syria, the signatories stress the significance of adherence to the Geneva approach 1 and the UN resolutions 2118 and 2254 in order to eliminate the tyrannical regime with all its pillars, and to achieve a political process with set goals and a timetable for the establishment of a democratic state whose constitution is committed to equal rights and of citizenship for all without distinction as to race, creed, belief or sex.

We affirm that as Syrians we are an unarmed people being besieged, surrounded by an international suspicious silence which can only be interpreted as not only approving what is happening, but complicit, overseeing it and directing the implementation and completion of the annihilation   of the Syrian people.

List of Signatories of the Plea to stop war in Ghouta & Syria, and to send International Observers

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بيان: قبل أن تصبح الغوطة مقبرة الأمم المتحدة والضمير الانساني ….