Syria Deeply Weekly Update: Toxic Bombs, Air Raids on Hospitals Hit Syria


WEEKLY UPDATE
August 13, 2016

Dear Readers,Welcome to the weekly Syria Deeply newsletter. We’ve rounded up the most important stories and developments about Syria and the Syrians in order to bring you valuable news and analysis. But first, here is a brief overview of what happened this week:Fighting intensified in several areas of Syria, the worst of it taking place in Aleppo. As clashes escalated, there were several reports this week that prohibited weapons had been used in at least two provinces in Syria.The Syrian Civil Defense, a group of volunteer rescue workers, accused Russia of dropping thermite bombs on civilian areas of rebel-held Idlib province over the weekend. If true, using the incendiary weapon in a civilian area would be a violation of the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons. On Thursday, medical officials in opposition-held Aleppo said barrel bombs believed to be filled with toxic gas fell on the neighborhood of Zubdiya, killing at least four people and injuring at least 55 others.At least three hospitals in Syria were hit in airstrikes this week. Over the weekend four airstrikes targeted a hospital in Idlib, killing at least 10 people. On Friday, airstrikes hit the last remaining hospital for women and children in Kafr Hamra, a town in northern Aleppo. At least two staff members were killed in the air raid. Activists inside rebel-held Aleppo also said that airstrikes also hit the Omar Abdul Aziz Hospital.According to a group of 15 of the last remaining doctors in eastern Aleppo, “Right now, there is an attack on a medical facility every 17 hours. At this rate our medical services in Aleppo could be completely destroyed in a month,” the doctors wrote in a statement addressed to President Barack Obama.Opposition forces broke the siege in eastern Aleppo over the weekend, but the battle for control of both the opposition-held and western, government-held areas continued this week in Syria’s largest city. Various rebel factions fighting in eastern Aleppo also launched an offensive to seize the western site of the city, effectively besieging some 1.5 million people.The U.N. warned that more than 2 million people living in Aleppo could fall under complete siege as fighting escalates in the city. Water has already been cut across the entire city. “Civilians on both sides of the conflict – on both sides of Aleppo – are in danger of being surrounded and affected by shortages and bombings,” Staffan de Mistura, the U.N. special envoy for Syria, said.On Wednesday, Russia announced it would implement daily three-hour cease-fires in Aleppo to allow aid deliveries. All military action, both ground and air, would be stopped for these three-hour periods and Moscow will coordinate with Damascus to “ensure that all interested organizations have the opportunity to deliver their humanitarian assistance to the residents of Aleppo,” Lieutenant-General Sergei Rudskoi, an official with the Russian defense ministry, said.Fighting also continued this week in other areas of northern Syria. The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an alliance of U.S.-backed Kurdish and Arab fighters, launched its final assault to clear out ISIS militants from Manbij city near the Turkish border. Last week, the SDF announced it had cleared roughly 90 percent of the city.On Friday, Russian airstrikes cut the water supply in the so-called Islamic State group’s de facto capital, Raqqa, BBC News reported. The strikes hit a water pumping station that supplied the city, killing at least 24 civilians, as well as six others whose affiliation could not be identified, according to the U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Weekly Highlights:

The Siege Sector: Why Starving Civilians Is Big Business

As 2 million people are at risk of coming under siege in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, researcher Will Todman speaks to Syria Deeply about the war economy that has taken hold in besieged areas across the country.

Anti-Syrian-government activists hold up placards during a sit-in against the ongoing siege imposed on the Syrian town of Madaya in front of the E.U. embassy in Beirut. AP/Hassan Ammar, File

Analysis: How Syrian Men Changed Under Militant Rule

ISIS has been increasing its influence on the local population, creating changes in the fabric of society that could outlive the militant group’s existence, Syrian journalist Jalal Zein al-Deen explains.

An ISIS flag hangs amid the ancient ruins of Palmyra in Syria July 4, 2015, after Islamic State group militants had previously seized the city. Islamic State Group

My Days in Damascus Entry 3: The Post-Revolution Generation

Farah, a young woman living in Syria’s capital city, explores the difficulties of living in Damascus, where most of the people her age have fled, giving way to a younger generation that is far less interested in the future of Syria.

View from a balcony in Damascus, Syria. Farah

Additional Reading

For new reporting and analysis every weekday, visit www.newsdeeply.com/syria.
You can reach our team with any comments or suggestions at info@newsdeeply.org.

Top image: Abu Mohammed al-Joulani, leader of the faction Jabhat al-Nusra, announces the group’s split from al-Qaida. Telegram

Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect: Atrocity Alert: South Sudan, Yemen and Nigeria

Atrocity Alert is a weekly publication by the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect highlighting and updating situations where populations are at risk of, or are enduring, mass atrocity crimes.

South Sudan

On 15 August, the one-year anniversary of the signing of a peace agreement to end South Sudan’s civil war, Human Rights Watch released a report documenting widespread abuses perpetrated by soldiers from the Sudan People’s Liberation Army during five days of fighting with rebel soldiers between 7 and 11 July. The report details widespread rape, noting that the UN has documented more than 200 cases of sexual violence since 7 July, as well as indiscriminate armed attacks on civilian-populated areas. Government forces also targeted populations based upon ethnicity, particularly non-Dinka civilians.

Last Friday, 12 August, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 2304 authorizing the creation of a Regional Protection Force within the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) to “engage any actor that is preparing attacks or engages in attacks” against UN protection of civilians sites, humanitarian actors or civilians. This Regional Protection Force needs to be deployed as soon as possible to bolster the efforts of UNMISS. In keeping with Resolution 2304, any further obstruction of UNMISS’ mandate or continued violations of international humanitarian and human rights law should result in the UN Security Council imposing an arms embargo on South Sudan.

IOM

Ibrahem Qasim

UNICEF/UN026956/Madhok

Yemen

Fighting in Yemen significantly escalated following the 6 August cessation of UN-mediated talks to end the civil war. On 12 August the UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Yemen raised alarm at the impact of the intensification of violence, with widespread reports of civilians killed and homes destroyed. On 13 August ten children were killed when airstrikes hit a religious school in Sa’ada and the following day fourteen people were killed when a Médecins Sans Frontières-supported hospital was bombed in Hajjah. The Saudi-led coalition has been implicated in both attacks. Meanwhile, the midterm report of the UN’s Panel of Experts on Yemen, leaked to the media last week, includes evidence of violations of international human rights and humanitarian law by all sides, noting that Houthis have used civilians as human shields to avoid attacks. All parties to the conflict must strictly adhere to international humanitarian and human rights law and take all necessary measures to avoid further civilian casualties. It is essential that all parties to the conflict reestablish peace talks without delay and commit to a long-term political solution to the civil war.

Nigeria

On 14 August Boko Haram published a video showing some of the more than 200 girls kidnapped from a secondary school in Chibok, Borno state, during April 2014. The video has been released during a leadership struggle within the extremist group between Abubakar Shekau, who has led the group since 2010, and Abu Musab al-Barnawi, who was recently appointed by the so-called Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Infighting within the leadership could result in dire consequences for populations as the rival leaders attempt to assert their control over the group. Al-Barnawi has declared his intention to increase Boko Haram’s targeting of Christians, putting these populations at greater risk of atrocities and potentially exacerbating religious tensions across the country. The government must provide protection to all vulnerable communities and renew efforts to secure the release of the Chibok girls, as well as the hundreds of other women and children abducted by Boko Haram.

Sam Olukoya/IRIN

Obinna Anyadike/IRIN

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ICTJ: What We Need: Asking Victims About Reparations in Côte d’Ivoire

8/10/2016

By Cristián Correa and Didier Gbery

For more than a year, in collaboration with the National Commission for Reconciliation and Compensation for Victims (CONARIV), ICTJ’s Reparative Justice Program has made an effort to consult with victims of Côte d’Ivoire’s 2010 post-election violence and its national government. These consultations are meant to push forward a definitive reparations policy that is based on the following four fundamental pillars: the need to prioritize the victims of the most serious violations; the need to focus on natural persons as victims; the need to implement a comprehensive policy that responds to the different consequences caused by those violations; and the need for a clear implementation strategy that provides certainty to victims.

ICTJ has worked with CONARIV, victims’ groups, and other government entities on reparations since 2012. A new briefing paper, titled “Recommendations for Victim Reparations in Côte d’Ivoire,” presents the conclusions of these consultations and makes recommendations to encourage the state of Côte d’Ivoire to advance its process of implementing a credible reparations policy through a participatory and transparent process.

Côte d’Ivoire faces a challenge in how to define a reparation policy that includes not just the victims who are near Abidjan or are politically connected, but also those in remote areas or with with more limited political access. Although the Programme National de Cohesion Sociale (PNCS), the Directorate of War Victims, and the Commission for Dialogue, Truth and Reconciliation (CDVR) made efforts to listen to victims and define a policy of reparations that would respond to the most serious consequences of the armed conflict, the policies fell short and failed to engage victims. Victims’ organizations did not have enough of a role in the process, and what limited participation they did have excluded those in the rural areas most affected by the post-election violence.

In establishing these consultations, we knew we had to encourage a process of dialogue in which victims in isolated regions, female victims, and victims of the most serious crimes could be involved in the process of policy-making. So we started by selecting the areas of the country that suffered the most during these periods of violence. We identified two neighborhoods in Abidjan, Abobo and Yopougon, and two other cities, Bouaké and Duékoué – the former near the center of the country who had suffered mainly during the 2002-2005 period of conflict, and the latter in the west, who had been affected by all the successive eruptions of political violence. Once selected, we began a process of mapping the victims’ groups in the area. The process of mapping heavily relied upon existing organizations located in the selected areas and we were able to identify 225 grassroots organizations.

We asked the groups the following questions: What are the most serious violations that occur in the area? What are the consequences of each one of those violations? What are the daily obstacles the victims face, and how are the effects felt differently by different groups of victims (widows, women, youth, etc.)?

We decided to work with separate women-specific victims groups in order for them to have their own definitive voice on the issue of reparations. This allowed for us to better understand the perspective of women victims and for all other organizations to grasp their perspective as well. Actually, having women presenting their own recommendations, and making concrete gender-based proposals while male leaders listened, resulted on an unintentional boost for their power and capacity in very traditional community organizations. In some cases, we also created youth-focused victims’ groups.

Through these discussions, we prompted the organizations to suggest concrete and prioritized proposals that would help victims of the most serious violations in overlooked and isolated regions overcome these various consequences and obstacles.

Meanwhile, we also worked closely with the government, making them acknowledge the need for consultation in the reparations process while also demonstrating to them that we were already working with victims. This pushed the government to organize a conference where 50 representatives of various organizations convened in Abidjan, the economic capital of Côte d’Ivoire, to present their proposals and conclusions. The conference went beyond simply providing an initial list of the most vulnerable victims to the government; instead it addressed how to register victims, how to implement reparation policies beyond monetary compensation, and how to formulate a clear and comprehensive implementation strategy nimble enough to adapt to the different challenges different victims face.

In this way we sought to transform basic principles into action according to the opinions of the numerous organizations. We felt encouraged by victims being able to speak so clearly, so strongly, and with even more knowledge than the authorities had on these issues.

Part of being a ‘victim’ is an experience of being passive, of not being strong enough. Part of a reparations process is to strengthen the capacity of victims to be agents. We seek to restore a political process that is respectful of people as citizens and not just recipients of charity, allowing victims to attain political dignity through their participation. We are not simply saying: “Let’s just propose a draft law that will have the principles embedded in them,” because that does not work.

The question is how many proposals are implemented and how many are implementable. The solution for reparation processes can be found in victims’ participation. Victims know best when telling us what might work and what will not and how to be realistic under different conditions for each country. This does not mean that government does not need to play a role, as those priorities need to be translated into budgets and policy implementation strategies, frequently checking with victims if those strategies are working well enough.

The briefing paper aims to help to organize Côte d’Ivoire’s reparations policy in a practical way. It includes some concrete definitions for forms of compensation, rehabilitation, and satisfaction of individual victims. It also includes proposals for community reparations, the search of the forcibly disappeared, access to documentation for those what have either lost them or have never been properly documented, a reconstruction policy specially focused on the areas most affected by the conflict, and symbolic reparations based on community participation.

It also highlights the need to undergo a budgetary exercise based on the profile and numbers of victims registered, which could help define responses to the priorities outlined.

In order to create lasting reconciliation between the victims of post-election violence and the Côte d’Ivoire state, the reparations program must respond to the most serious consequences of the violence for victims through measures that address their long-lasting socioeconomic, psychosocial, and education-related effects for victims and their children.

We recommend an implementation strategy that requires a timeline for the different actions to follow. Reparations should be a joint effort between policies that work to guarantee the non-repetition of political violence and repression and policies that enforce the respect for human rights and humanitarian law in all state institutions. Both sets of policies require mechanisms that oversee the conduct of armed forces and state institutions while also investigating and prosecuting serious violations of human rights.

We hope that, with the recommendations included in this briefing paper, the Côte d’Ivoire government will be able to take state responsibility and recognize the serious consequences caused by its violence and thus set the foundation for a better, more just future.

 

Follow Didier and Cristián on a series of consultations in our photo gallery.
PHOTO: During group consultations, Moussa Soulama stresses the urgent need for school infrastructure in Bouaké.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: #SaveSyria

Dear Colleague,

This summer the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad stepped up its attacks on rebel forces and Syrian civilians, this time besieging the ancient city of Aleppo. In Syria’s largest city, territory had been divided between government control in the west and opposition control in the east. Last month the government surrounded the eastern part of the city, indiscriminately bombing the residents and systematically blocking delivery of food and medical supplies.

The main roadway in or out, Castello Road, became a harrowing passage dotted with burned out cars and permeated by the smell of death. Anyone attempting to enter or leave faced attack.

Largely cut off from outside assistance, the 300,000 desperate residents in Aleppo, including 120,000 children, lived mostly without food, water, medical supplies or electricity. They faced daily, deadly attacks and even starvation.

This video tells the story of life under siege and chronicles the efforts of some of those trying to assist.

Please share this video and help us raise awareness to #SaveSyria.

WATCH THE VIDEO
Sincerely,

Cameron Hudson
Director, Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide
Image courtesy of Aleppo Media Center.