French prosecutors said Monday they had requested a new arrest warrant for former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad over the deaths in a 2013 chemical attack after an earlier one was overturned.
It will now be up to investigating magistrates to decide whether to issue a new warrant.
French investigators have been investigating since 2021 the alleged sarin gas attack carried out by the Syrian government on August 4-5, 2013, in the Adra and Douma areas outside the Syrian capital Damascus, which US intelligence says killed more than 1,000 people.
The Court of Cassation, France’s highest court, ruled on Friday that there are no exceptions to presidential immunity, even for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity, annulling a French arrest warrant for Assad issued in 2023, when he was still leader.
However, it added that since Assad, who was ousted in December, is no longer president, new warrants could be issued and the French investigation could continue.
The National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office (PNAT) said on Friday it had requested “the issuance and international dissemination of an arrest warrant for Bashar al-Assad on charges of complicity in crimes against humanity and complicity in war crimes” in the chemical attack case.
According to Russian authorities, Assad and his family fled to Russia after Islamist-led militants seized power on December 8.
French authorities have already issued another arrest warrant for Assad, issued in January on suspicion of complicity in war crimes related to the 2017 bombing in the Syrian city of Daraa that killed a French civilian of Syrian origin.
EU to lift all remaining economic sanctions against Syria
The move is seen as another attempt to give the country a chance for economic recovery after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in January.
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Source: Source