In December 2024, prison cell doors broke open, streets filled with people gathering in celebration, and in the morning, when the sun rose, its light cast upon a liberated nation. At last, the Assad regime had fallen. 

With this new chapter, domestic transitional justice is now seen as not only possible, but also essential for Syria to move forward as a country. Yet the intersection of international law and transitional justice in Syria contains a core dilemma. 

Jeremy Julian Sarkin in his book, The Conflict in Syria and the Failure of International Law to Protect People Globally: Mass Atrocities, Enforced Disappearances and Arbitrary Detentions argues that  “International law, in general, is weakened—especially when it comes to dealing with conflict and human rights abuses—by issues of state consent, by a system of states ratifying treaties, by having hard and soft law rules that are often not complied with or enforced as well as many others” (35). Further, he adds that international humanitarian law (IHL) deals with civilians as a whole, not taking into consideration the fact that there are multiple different groups within a population, and specifically, in Syria’s case, different sectarian groups. He adds that IHL does not address the struggling dynamic between these groups that add an internal pressure. Though international human rights law (IHRL) does discuss the most vulnerable populations, that IHL does not, its implementation falls short as there are rarely few enforcement options, and the mechanisms that do take place are very few and far in between. 

The UN, in Sarkin's view, falls short on providing human rights protection as it majorly attempts to ensure state adherence to IHRL obligations through soft law. Syria is an example of this strategy with the UN having passed multiple resolutions to attempt at warranting the Ba’ath’s regime’s compliance to IHRL, but failed its enforcement. Sarkin gives an example of one of the major soft law initiatives that is the “responsibility to protect” (R2P) enshrined in the non-binding World Summit Outcome Document of the U.N. General Assembly on October 24, 2005. 

For decades, the UN prioritized respect for state sovereignty: a principle of no other country can interfere with the domestic affairs of another. R2P came about as a consequence of scholars and diplomats rethinking this idea after the genocides in Rwanda and the wars in former Yugoslavia in the 1990s. This text calls on states to protect their own populations from crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. If states fail to do so, it calls on the international community, through the UN, to intervene and protect populations from such crimes. 

Sarkin criticizes R2P, suggesting that its relevance only exists in the face of atrocious crimes, but rarely in their actual event. He criticizes the state-centric legal frameworks used to prevent and respond to mass atrocities and ultimately concludes, “international law and the UN have not been sufficiently focused or able to provide protection to people in peril around the world” (143).To build on this idea, Adrian Gallagher writes in his article, Farewell the Responsibility to Protect? False Death, Grave Crisis, Future Opportunities that the foundational protection of human rights is what is in crisis and the challenges R2P finds in its application is an example of that. He notes that the countries that created the norm have vanished from the international order and therefore “R2P has been weakened by a broader crisis in the liberal international order, as the institutions, laws, rules, norms and principles that have traditionally been viewed as binding together international society are questioned, challenged and violated on a daily basis.” For instance, states, arguably, have been actively distancing themselves from their collective obligations to IHRL by changing the language surrounding it. Where we would previously hear “a responsibility to protect,” we now hear “atrocity prevention” writes Alexander Bellamy in his article, The Discomfort for Politics. He uses the example of the UK established Mass Atrocity Prevention Hub in which conversations Bellamy had with members of the hub revealed that there was little knowledge around R2P or an intentional avoidance around it. This becomes problematic as states’ obligation to IHL becomes subject to the incremental change of international norms, as observed in the findings of Pankhe and Peterson in Norm challenges and norm death (page 14). 

As international norms continue to be contested regarding their application, what falls under international responsibility is not what is in question, the question is how to enforce international responsibility in a system that relies on a state’s assumption that they owe responsibility (which is often endowed in their own political will). For example, we see this in the international communities’ response to the genocide occuring in Gaza. Perpetrators of the Ba’ath regime are being tried for their starvation and siege of the Yarmouk camp, a camp which Amnesty International cited it to be home to 180,000 Palestinian refugees and several hundred thousand Syrians, while the international community continues to do nothing as Israel continues to lay siege and starve Gaza, although both crimes have striking similarities. A medical worker that spoke to Amnesty International regarding the deaths of three women and five newborn babies in the period between December 2013 and January 2014 said: “Babies are dying because there is no milk, neither powder nor from their own mothers.” Al-Jazeera reported back in August 31, 2025 a conversation they had with Ameera Tafesh who had brought her “emaciated 6-month-old” to the clinic: “I breastfed her when she was born, but it lasted only a week because I couldn’t produce enough milk. I need to feed her formula, but it’s not available.” Residents of the Yarmouk Camp continue to advocate for Palestine. 

Moreover, international law has also played a positive role for the Syrian society by allowing them to pursue justice under laws of universal jurisdiction. Before the fall of the Assad regime, Syrians pursuing justice didn’t have many avenues besides international tribunals and foreign courts. Now that they have the option of domestic courts and trials, the role universal jurisdiction will play comes into question. 

Universal jurisdiction proceedings are needed to bridge the gap until domestic accountability mechanisms become available. The new Syrian government has made calls for high level perpetrators to be extradited to Syria if they are arrested elsewhere. However, how soon this will be the situation depends on the diplomatic ties and legal assistance agreements Syria makes with other states. It is also notable that these ties for many states are dependent on a minimum standards of due process to be guaranteed when cooperating. International law would also have to be codified into Syrian law if suspects are tried for war crimes or crimes against humanity. For the current Syrian judiciary, this will take time to build. So, without international arrest warrants from Syria, it is necessary for universal jurisdiction investigations to continue in order to arrest perpetrators who are traveling. Notably, however, universal jurisdiction is reliant on host-state political will and resources. 

Furthermore, Syrians again see a limit to their justice seeking processes as the Syrian government has limited the transitional justice processes to be only concerned with crimes committed by the regime. Yasmine Mashaan, Syrian activist and a founding member of the Caesar Families Association wrote a post (about this presidential decision) that reads: “The decision is telling me to discriminate between my brother who disappeared at the hands of the regime and my brother who disappeared at the hands of ISIS.” Trials that are likely to not happen in Syria, such as trials against the crimes committed by Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham or the Syrian National Army, should take place internationally. 

Universal jurisdiction's impact on transitional justice is critiqued by its inability to correspond with the victim’s voice. The lack of translation and its inability to reach out to the wider Syrian population can become a form of bureaucratic detachment. To seek justice for Syrians, and not with them. To speak for Syrians, instead of listening to them. In 2021, after the Koblenz Trials, Noura Aljizawi, a Syrian researcher with City Lab told Al-Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy regarding the fear and disillusionment amongst Syrians, despite the trials outcomes: “From the perspective of transitional justice or accountability in the long-term, there are a lot of questions. Particularly for survivors and victims’ inside Syria…we [still] have a lot of fear about the future. We don’t have proper answers, because there is no discussion or debate for our future as Syrians.” Additionally, trials don’t necessarily respond to victims and survivors’ needs, although it emphasizes attempting to achieve just outcomes. Testifying is a traumatic event, let alone testifying in a host-country that does not speak your language, know your people and may lack proper community support. Aljizawi continued, “Access to justice is not the only approach or outcomes these victims are expecting. They also need to be supported through this journey psychologically, as well as through psychosocial support provided by their families and their hosting communities.”

Universal jurisdiction can however, also have a positive impact on transitional justice as it adds precedent for other courts and tribunals. It can also become a way to learn how to add to the wider process of transitional justice, in Syria and other countries. 

While legal justice has its rightful place, it is important to see the gaps that may take away from the victims. Alijizawi emphasizes survivors and those sharing testimonies’ need for psychological and community support. 

Ruti Teitel, one of the first thinkers in transitional justice, called it “the conception of justice associated with periods of political change.” Teitel writes that the idea of justice is challenged during the time of political transition, when legal frameworks are unstable and unclear. Transitional justice’s state-centric framework, justice dependent on the willingness of the state to prosecute said perpetrator—whether that be in its domestic or international efforts—can add to this sentiment of justice being not an avenue sought due to moral responsibility, but justice adjusted to political stability. Justice that prioritizes the state’s benefit, even at the cost of not concerning itself with the victim—the one who requires justice. This can become another form of dehumanization for victims. Victims of violence are subjected to a very specifically vile relationship between them and their perpetrator: their personhood becoming property of their oppressor. Justice, which is such a personal thing, which is tied to the victim’s liberation from their offender, becomes obsolete if it does not focus on, at the very minimum, an attempt of recognizing a victim’s own personhood, and then returning their birthright of this humanity being respected. The state cannot make the victim’s grief its property, a strategic tool used to negotiate peace and politics. It cannot recognize victims on a surface level as Nancy Fraser, a prominent political philosopher, warns, it must instead be reminded by the grief of victims of the immorality that plagued its society, and that it is now in a constant struggle to liberate itself. 

German sociologist Max Weber in his 1918 lecture, Politics as a Vocation, talks about two kinds of moral thinking: the ethic of conviction, which is the strict following of principles, and the ethic of responsibility, which thinks about the consequences of actions. This form of thinking influences the state in how it chooses to move forward in seeking justice without disturbing social peace in the transitional context. This may translate to the state, which so often is focused on peace-making in this political transition, to ask victims to accept apologies from their offenders. This act sometimes can be interpreted as justice becoming a performance of reconciliation. It does not truly attend to the victim's healing and may add to the sense of betrayal for the victim. 

The severity of loss that Syrians have experienced is one that cannot be reduced to statistics. 

Each life that has been stolen is also each confession stolen from a lover, a hug stolen from a father, a kiss stolen from a mother, a handshake stolen from a sibling, a smile stolen from a friend. The severity of imprisonment is not one that words can translate. It freezes a person, allowing them breath, but denying them being. The enforced disappearance of people is a cruelty which denies the disappeared person and their family both death and life. There is neither past nor present nor future for the disappeared person and his family. There is just absence. 

The perpetrators must answer. But, now in the pursuit of a new Syria, Syrians are also forced to answer a rather unfair question: What does justice mean, and in the avenues pursued in the name of justice, who benefits? 

Abiya Hasan is an undergraduate student at UCLA studying International Development Studies. Her research interests lie in de-colonial and revolutionary struggle and thought, and more broadly, human rights, with a regional focus in the MENA and South Asia region. In the summer of 2025, she completed an internship with the MENA Prison Forum.