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Syria--politics and government--20th century; Syria--Dustūr (1950)

• Introduction
• Law, politics and religion in Syria : past and present
• Mapping the plurality of jurisdictions : the laws of personal status
• Debating and changing family law
• Patriarchy, religion and legal rules
• The versatility of personal status law : legal practices in a Sharʻiyya court
• The Catholic court : guardian of order and sacraments
• Conclusions.

The current Syrian crisis has its roots in the sectarian nature of the country's multi-religious society. Since Ottoman times, the different religious communities have enjoyed the right to regulate and administer their own family relations. Matters of personal status including marriage, divorce, child custody and inheritance continue to be managed by a variety of religious laws and courts operating simultaneously within the legal system of the state. However, this complex system of competing jurisdictions has also affected inter-communal relations and has been used to deepen communal divides. Esther van Eijk discusses socio-legal practices in Syria by focusing on three courts: a shar'iyya, a Catholic court and a Greek-Orthodox court. While the plurality of Syrian family law is clear, she shows how - irrespective of religious affiliation - it is nevertheless characterised by the prevalence of shared cultural or patriarchal views and norms on marital relations, family and gender. Based on extensive fieldwork, Family Law in Syria offers a detailed analysis of a country that has in recent years been inaccessible to researchers.The book is a vital contribution to the growing literature on personal status laws in the Middle East and sheds light on the historical, socio-political and religious complexities and fault-lines that mark contemporary Syria.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• 1. Introduction
• 2. Research Design and Methodology
• 3. Theorizing the nexus between transitional justice and peacebuilding
• 4. Evolution of Transitional Justice
• 5. Lessons from Liberia's Transitional Justice Process
• 6. Outlook Towards a Syrian-led Approach to Transitional Justice
• 7. Complexities of the Safe Return of Refugees 8. Conclusion
• 9. Appendices.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

This book offers an analysis of a prospective transitional justice process in Syria. As the Syrian conflict enters into its tenth year, this book asks how the sustained human rights violations and war crimes could possibly be addressed in a post-conflict setting, particularly in the context of the widespread displacement crisis. Despite a recent movement in scholarship toward bottom-up peacebuilding approaches and participatory transitional justice models, the transitional justice and local peacebuilding nexus remains under-theorized, particularly as it relates to the engagement of displaced populations. This book seeks to address this gap through the conceptualization of a locally driven transitional justice process for Syria that is founded on the integration of refugees and displaced populations. Through offering a series of policy recommendations on how to implement such a process, it aims to make a contribution to building a bridge of exchange between the policy/practitioner world and the academy in this area of study.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Summary
• Chronology of events
• Summary and extrajudicial executions
• Other unlawful killings of civilians
• Burning and destruction of houses and other property
• Arbitrary detention, torture, and enforced disappearances
• Applicability of international humanitarian law
• Recommendations.

As the United Nations special envoy Kofi Annan was negotiating with the Syrian government an end to the fighting in Syria in late March 2012, government forces launched a series of large-scale attacks against opposition-controlled towns in the northern part of Idlib governorate, near the Turkish border. Between March 22 and April 6, government forces killed at least 95 civilians in five towns, burned, destroyed and looted hundreds of houses and stores, and arbitrarily detained dozens of people, most of whom remain in detention to date. At least 35 of the killed civilians were executed when detained or otherwise under the control of government forces. This report is based on interviews with victims and witnesses conducted in five towns in Syria that came under attack during the two-week long military operation. It contains detailed descriptions of the attacks, including several incidents of mass executions.

• Summary
• Recommendations
• To the UN Security Council
• To All Countries
• To the Arab League
• To Russia and China
• To the Syrian Government
• Methodology
• I. Arrest, Detention, and Torture in Syria
• Arbitrary Arrests and Unlawful Detention
• Conditions in Detention
• Systematic Use of Torture and Deaths in Custody
• Detention and Torture of Children, Women and Elderly
• II. Syria's Detention Facilities
• Department of Military Intelligence
• Branch 291--Damascus--Branch 235 ("Palestine Branch")
• Damascus--Branch 248--Damascus
• Branch 227--Damascus
• Branch 215--Damascus
• Branch 245--Daraa
• Aleppo Branch
• Branch 271--Idlib
• Homs Branch
• Latakia Branch
• Air Force Intelligence Directorate
• Mezzeh Airport Branch-- Damascus
• Bab Touma Branch--Damascus
• Daraa Branch
• Homs branch
• Latakia Branch
• Political Security Directorate
• Mezzeh area--Damascus
• Idlib Branch
• Homs Branch
• Latakia Branch
• Daraa Branch
• General Intelligence Directorate
• Branch 285--Damascus
• Al-Khattib Branch--Damascus
• Latakia Branch
• Aleppo Branch
• Idlib Branch
• Homs Branch
• Ad Hoc and Joint Detention Facilities
• Central Prison--Idlib
• Acknowledgements.

"Since the beginning of anti-government protests in March 2011, Syrian authorities have subjected tens of thousands of people to arbitrary arrests, unlawful detentions, enforced disappearances, ill-treatment and torture using an extensive network of detention facilities, an archipelago of torture centers, scattered throughout Syria. Based on more than 200 interviews with former detainees, including women and children, and defectors from the Syrian military, intelligence and security agencies, Torture Archipelago: Arbitrary Arrests, Torture and Enforced Disappearances in Syria's Underground Prisons since March 2011 focuses on 28 of these detention facilities. For each facility, most of them with cells and torture chambers and one or several underground floors, we provide the location, identify the agencies responsible for operating them, document the type of ill-treatment and torture used, and name, to the extent possible, the individuals running them. The facilities included in this report are those for which multiple witnesses have indicated the same location and provided detailed descriptions about the use of torture. The actual number of such facilities is likely much higher. The systematic patterns of ill-treatment and torture documented in this report clearly point to a state policy of torture and ill-treatment and therefore constitute a crime against humanity. The United Nations Security Council should refer the situation in Syria to the International Criminal Court, adopt targeted sanctions on officials credibly implicated in abuses, and demand that Syria grant recognized international detention monitors access to all detention facilities, including those mentioned in this report."--P. [4] of cover.

• Introduction: Syria's challenge to the promise of international justice
• A short history of a long conflict : from revolution to atrocity
• The Security Council and international crimes in Syria : a study in dysfunction
• Deconstructing the would-be ICC referral : the politics of international justice in the Security Council
• Prospects for justice before the International Criminal Court
• A menu of models for accountability : options for an Ad Hoc Tribunal for Syria
• National courts step up : Syrian cases proceeding in domestic courts
• Civil suits : The utility of state responsibility and the law of tort
• Innovations in international criminal law documentation methodologies and institutions
• Transitional justice without transition : the international community's efforts in Syria
• Conclusion

This book situates the war in Syria within the actual and imagined system of international criminal justice. It explores the legal impediments and diplomatic challenges that have led to the fatal trinity affecting Syria: the massive commission of international crimes that are subject to detailed investigations and documentation but whose perpetrators have enjoyed virtually complete impunity. Given this tragic state of affairs, the book tracks a number of accountability solutions being explored within multilateral initiatives and by civil society actors, including innovations of institutional design; the renewed utility of a range of domestic jurisdictional principles (including the revival of universal jurisdiction in Europe); the emergence of creative investigative and documentation techniques, technologies, and organizations; and the rejection of state consent as a precondition for the exercise of jurisdiction. Engaging both law and policy around international justice, the text offers a set of justice blueprints, within and without the International Criminal Court. It also considers the utility, propriety, and practicality of pursuing a transitional justice program without a genuine political transition. All told, the book attempts to capture results of the creative energy radiating from members of the international community intent on advancing the accountability norm in Syria even in the face of geopolitical blockages within the U.N. Security Council. In so doing, it presents the range of juridical measures-both criminal and civil - that would be available to the international community to respond to the crisis, if only the political will existed.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)