Verdict expected in landmark Syrian torture case
A German court is likely to choose Wednesday if a Syrian man who fled his country's civil war was an accomplice to crimes against humanity.
Eyad al-Gharib, 44, allegedly assisted the torture of Syrians as a authorities intelligence officer.
Another Syrian - Anwar Raslan, 58 - remains in trial. Both got asylum in Germany but were arrested in 2019.
It's the first such trial over alleged atrocities committed by President Bashar al-Assad's regime.
Prosecutors found in Koblenz, western Germany, would like five-and-a-half years in jail for Eyad al-Gharib.
Defense legal representatives argued that the pair were ordered to commit the alleged crimes and feared punishment if they did not obey.
The agency the men allegedly worked for played a crucial purpose in suppressing the peaceful pro-democracy protests that erupted against President Assad's regime in 2011.
Germany is trying the pair beneath the principle of "universal jurisdiction", that allows any region to prosecute those accused of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.
For a few Syrians the trial, which started out in April 2020, is a rare opportunity for justice for a community which has seen countless atrocities.
"This trial represents the initial step towards justice that the Syrian victims include truly felt," rights legal professional Anwar al-Bunni told the BBC from Germany, where he sought asylum.
Mr Bunni says he was arrested by Anwar Raslan found in the Syrian capital Damascus and was shocked to soon after come in person with him in a good Berlin shop. He offers been assisting prosecutors in organizing the case.
"Although this trial is devoted to several defendants... it targets the infernal equipment of torture and murder [of President Assad's regime]," he said.
Prosecutors say both men were "cogs found in the wheel" enabling a good vast state torture equipment to use, according to German mass media..
Eyad al-Gharib is charged with bringing at least 30 protesters to a good notorious Damascus prison to end up being tortured in 2011, even while working for Syria's most powerful civilian intelligence firm, the overall Intelligence Directorate (GID).
His defence attorneys highlight his willing co-procedure with German authorities and assistance in providing facts against Anwar Raslan.
Eyad al-Gharib says he defected from Mr Assad's regime to greatly help the opposition and then fled Syria in 2013, arriving in Germany found in 2018.
Anwar Raslan is suspected of being mixed up in torture of at least 4,000 persons in 2011-12. He's billed with 58 counts of murder as well as rape and sexual assault.
He is accused to be a high-ranking officer responsible for the GID's Al-Khatib prison in Damascus, referred to as "Hell ON THE PLANET". If convicted, he faces life in prison.
Hours of witness testimony laid bare the mechanics of the Syrian regime's alleged brutalities. Prosecutors described killing and torture on an "almost industrial scale", regarding to German broadcaster Deutsche Welle.
In court, witnesses described being beaten and kicked on arrival at the Damascus prison. They spoke to be raped and hung from the ceiling for hours, how torturers tore their fingernails out and offered them electric shocks, in that case doused them with normal water.
The case is ground-breaking for giving Syrian torture victims a rare voice in a legal court.
The evidence included a large number of images leaked by a armed service defector referred to as Caesar. Mr Somos explained "the Caesar photographs and other evidence of horrendous talk about torture on a mass scale were publicly reviewed, and the legal record will continue steadily to serve in a range of future cases".
Mr Assad's authoritarian federal government has repeatedly denied accusations of torturing and forcibly disappearing thousands of people.
In addition to the pair, Germany is investigating a large number of former Syrian officials accused of atrocities.
