Leave No Traces: The Burning and Disposal of Human Remains by the Syrian Government

The Syrian Center for Justice and Accountability said in a new investigation Monday that “Syrian military intelligence and the 9th Division of the Syrian Army burned the bodies of civilians, dissidents, members of the opposition and other non-combatants killed in field executions.”

The report “Leave No Trace: Burning and Disposing of the Remains of Victims by the Syrian Government” explains the systematic manner in which the Syrian Government documented the destruction of human remains.

The Executive Director of the Syrian Center for Justice and Accountability, Mohammed al-Abdullah, said: “High-ranking Syrian military intelligence officers and the Syrian army have been involved in the illegal destruction of the remains.” He added: “They did this while being photographed by military intelligence officers, indicating that all levels of the army were aware of the destruction of evidence of crimes.”

The report documents cases in which non-combatants were captured by Syrian government forces. While these civilians should have been considered protected under international humanitarian law, the Syrian Centre for Justice and Accountability’s investigation reveals that they have been subjected to field executions and that their bodies have been destroyed, which could hinder criminal investigations that could be used in future accountability efforts.

The lead investigator in the report said: “The Syrian Center for Justice and Accountability’s investigation relied on evidence found from a government laptop containing photographic evidence and graphic clips, of torture, murder and post-mortem crimes committed by military intelligence and members of the 34th Armoured Brigade of the Ninth Division.” He added: “While most of this evidence was presented directly by the perpetrators, the Syrian Center for Justice and Accountability was able to match our findings through open-source information and government intelligence documents pre-stored in the Syrian Center for Justice and Accountability database.”

The Syrian Centre for Justice and Accountability is a Syrian rights organization working for Syria’s effective justice and accountability so that perpetrators are held accountable and adressing grievances, leading to lasting peace. The Syrian Centre collects documentation of violations from all available sources, stores them in a secure database, catalogues them in accordance with human rights standards and analyses them using legal expertise and big data methodologies to promote transitional justice and peace making.