Report: Lebanese Lawyers File Lawsuit against Assad at ICC

Lebanese lawyers representing Syrian refugees in northern Lebanon filed a lawsuit to the first chief prosecutor of the Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) Luis Moreno-Ocampo against Syrian President Bashar Assad, the Kuwaiti al-Anba newspaper reported on Thursday.

The refugees accused Assad, who is the supreme commander of the Syrian Army and armed forces, and his accomplices of committing “murders, war crimes, genocides and crimes against humanity” in Syria since the March 2010 uprising against the regime.

“Over a year ago, peaceful protests kicked off in Syria demanding freedom and democracy… But Assad gave instructions to the army to launch a crackdown on protesters and to commit mass murder and massacres which caused the death of 12,000 unarmed Syrian people,” the refugees said in their complaint.

According to al-Anba, the complaint was supported with evidence including videos, filmed confessions, photos, witness statements and written documents to prove the validity of these crimes.

Lebanese lawyer Tariq Shandab, who is head of the legal center to protect the rights of refugees and one of the lawyers representing the Syrian refugees, said that “the complaint was supported with valid evidence… that condemns the regime.”

He told al-Anba that the “crimes committed by the Syrian regime are far more dangerous than those committed by former Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi.”

Shandab stressed that the legal suit will be followed up legally “until the victims and their families receive their rights and justice is fully achieved.”

According to the U.N. refugee agency, UNHCR, there are around 16,000 Syrian refugees in Lebanon.