Syrian Court Launches Public Trial of Ex-Assad Officials, Including General in Custody

Najib, who served as head of the political security branch in southern Syria's Daraa province under Assad, was the only defendant arrested and present in person for the preparatory session. The trial, which will continue next month, also charged Assad and his brother Maher Assad, former commander of the Syrian military's 4th Armored Division, in absentia, along with a number of other former high-ranking security officials.

The judge announced, 'Today we begin the first trials of transitional justice in Syria,' as he opened the session. Crowds gathered outside the courthouse in Damascus on Sunday to celebrate. Najib held his position in Daraa in 2011 when teenagers who scrawled antigovernment graffiti on a school wall were arrested and tortured.

That incident became a catalyst for mass protests against the repressive policies of Assad's security forces, which were met by a brutal government crackdown. The protests spiraled into a 14-year civil war that left an estimated half a million people dead and ended with Assad's ouster in a lightning rebel offensive in December 2024.

Assad fled to Russia in December 2024, and most members of his inner circle escaped Syria.

Maher Assad, who fled Syria, oversaw the 4th Armored Division, which ran its own detention centers according to Syrian opposition activists. Charges against Najib relate to events in Daraa, including the killing of protesters. Ramez Abu Nabbout, one of the plaintiffs in the trial, said his brother, a father of three, was killed when security forces opened fire on protesters at Daraa’s Omari Mosque.

'He was a civilian and peaceful, but Atef Najib greeted peaceful [protesters] with gunfire,' Abu Nabbout said. In a related development, Syrian authorities arrested Amjad Yousef, a former intelligence officer, on Friday. Yousef appeared in a video leaked four years ago that shows him and his comrades executing dozens of blindfolded and shackled prisoners in the Damascus suburb of Tadamon during the civil war.

The government of interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa has faced criticism over delays in launching a promised transitional justice process. Syria continues to struggle following the civil war that displaced millions and left the country battered and divided.