
United Nations human rights chief Michelle Bachelet on Thursday urged nations to step up trials in their respective national courts against alleged war criminals in Syria as the conflict marks its 10th year. She also told that attempts to refer atrocities in Syria to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague for the prosecution have failed.
Only one person has been convicted in a foreign court for crimes against humanity or war crimes in a conflict that has cost hundreds of thousands of lives, many of them civilians.
A German court sentenced a former member of President Bashar al-Assad’s security services to four and half years in prison last month for encouraging the torture of civilians, the first of its kind verdict for crimes against humanity in the Syrian war.