November 22, 2008
Syria releases 190 in effort to ease international pressure
BEIRUT, Lebanon - Syrian President Bashar Assad freed 190 political prisoners yesterday in another sign his regime is trying to head off international pressure over its apparent involvement in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.
But Assad did not grant amnesty to the two most prominent political prisoners, Riad Seif and Maamoun Homsi. The pair were independent members of the Syrian parliament who started a democracy campaign in 2000, shortly after Assad came to power. They were arrested in early 2001 and their democracy forums were shut down.
About 100 of those released yesterday - on the Muslim holiday of Eid ul-Fitr, marking the end of Ramadan - were members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood, which fought against the Syrian regime in the 1970s and '80s. The amnesty also included 20 activists from smaller Islamist groups and 20 former members of Syria's ruling Baath Party.
Among the most prominent prisoners released were Azzam Ghareib, a Muslim Brotherhood leader; Mohammad Raadoun, head of the Arab Organization for Human Rights; and Ali Abdullah, a writer and democracy activist. Human rights groups say there are still as many as 2,500 political prisoners in Syrian prisons.
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"This was a good first step, but the Syrians will have to do more to ease international pressure," said an Arab diplomat involved in talks with Assad's regime. He spoke on the condition of anonymity. "They will have to free other political prisoners, start a dialogue with the opposition and cooperate in the Hariri investigation."
A United Nations report into the Feb. 14 car bombing that killed Hariri and 20 others concluded that the plot was carried out after months of planning and extensive surveillance of Hariri, most likely by top Syrian and Lebanese security officials. The decision to assassinate Hariri "could not have been taken without the approval of top-ranked Syrian security officials and could not have been further organized without the collusion of their counterparts in the Lebanese security services," said the report, which was released Oct. 20.
The United States, France and Britain lobbied for a UN resolution that threatened Syria with sanctions unless it cooperates fully with the UN probe. The resolution, which was unanimously approved Monday by the Security Council, requires Syria to detain any Syrian official or civilian deemed by UN investigators as a suspect. Damascus also would have to allow investigators to take suspects and witnesses out of the country for questioning, or to interview them inside Syria without government officials present.
If Syria does not cooperate with the UN team led by German investigator Detlev Mehlis, the Security Council could then take "further action," such as imposing economic sanctions.
An early version of the UN report named Assad's brother and brother-in-law as among five Syrian officials who plotted Hariri's killing. Mehlis expunged the names from the report hours before it was released, saying they were meant for the Security Council's eyes only. The men have all denied involvement in the plot, and they have not been detained. Under mounting pressure, Assad created a judicial committee last week to investigate any Syrian complicity in the plot.
Hariri's killing prompted international pressure and popular protests that led to the resignation of Syrian-backed Lebanese Prime Minister Omar Karami and to the withdrawal of thousands of Syrian troops in April. Syria had kept troops in Lebanon since 1976, a year after the start of a civil war.
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