GENEVA — The UN human rights office will send a small team of human rights officers to Syria next week for the first time in years following the overthrow of President Bashar Assad, UN spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan told a press briefing on Friday.
As part of the takeover, rebels have flung open prisons and government offices and raising fresh hopes for accountability for crimes committed during Syria’s more than 13-year civil war.
Under Assad, the UN human rights team has not been allowed in Syria for years, Al-Kheetan said, and has been monitoring abuses remotely.
He said that the team would support human rights issues and help ensure that any power transition is “inclusive and within the framework of international law.”
“It is important for us to start establishing a presence,” he said. A UN investigative body also hopes to travel to Syria to secure evidence that could implicate top officials of the former government.
Earlier on Friday, the head of the UN migration agency warned that large-scale returns of refugees to Syria could overwhelm the country and even stoke conflict at a fragile moment with the fall of Assad regime.
“We believe that millions of people returning would create conflict within an already fragile society,” said Amy Pope, director-general of the International Organization for Migration, told a Geneva press briefing after a trip to the country.
“We are not promoting large scale returns. The communities, frankly, are just not ready to absorb the people who are displaced.”
AN-REUTERS
Residents stand in line to buy bread from a bakery in Aleppo, Syria. (File/AP)