Operation Ostrava: Month 14, Week, 4, Day 2.

This past week in Syria the United Nations Support Mission In Syria (UNSMIS) has been boosted by the appointment of the Norwegian Major General Robert Mood as the mission commander. The number of UNSMIS observers has also increased to 30 and is expected to rise to 60 over the coming days. Despite this sporadic fighting has continued between Syrian and Saudi Irregular Army (SIA) fighters in Douma, Hama, Damascus, Homs and Aleppo. On Wednesday (25/4/12) a SIA bomb factory exploded in a civilian apartment complex in Hama destroying the buidling and killing 16. Today (30/4/12) two bombs exploded at Syrian military barracks in Idlib killing 20. The most worrying development though occurred on Friday (27/4/12) when a suicide bomber killed 11 as they prayed at the Zein al-Abidin Mosque in Damascus. This is alarming because up until now SIA bombings have been so-called rational attacks in which the bombers try to get as far away as possible from their bombs before they explode. The move towards suicide bombings suggests the involvement of Al Qaeda linked groups and indeed (30/4/12) a Jihadist group called the al-Nusra Front have claimed responsibility for Friday's attack.

Despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of recent violence has been carried out by the SIA against Syrian targets both the Arab League and the French foreign minister have called for a Chapter 7 United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolution on Syria. A Chapter 7 resolution would allow for Libya-style military intervention against Syria but there is little chance of the UNSC passing such a resolution.

The big development in Syria this week has actually come from the United Nations Special Court on Sierra Leone which on Thursday (26/4/12) convicted Charles Taylor on 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity. While the court (whose preliminary verdict can be read here; www.sc-sl.org) did not find convincing evidence that Charles Taylor had effective command and control over Revolutionary United Front (RUF) fighters it held that he was legally responsible for their actions because he had supplied them with non-lethal equipment including communications equipment (paragraphs 77-80) along with food, body armour, other clothing and medical supplies (paragraphs 83&84). In short Charles Taylor was supplying the RUF with exactly what members of the Syria Contact Group including Britain and the United States are proudly supplying to the SIA. Although every case should be tried on it's individual merits members of the Syria Contact Group will now have to come up with a very good excuse to explain why they are not legally responsible for the actions of the SIA.

While it is still debatable whether or not the SIA's bombing campaign constitutes a crime against humanity namely inflicting terror their mere presence constitutes a war crime contrary to Article 4(2) of the third Geneva Convention - the use of unlawful combatants. In order to be declared a lawful combatant the SIA must fulfil all four of the criteria laid out in the relevant part of the convention namely;

(a) "be commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates." That is to say that there must be a fixed command structure and a disciplinary procedure for violations. At present the SIA operate in small groups doing what they like when they like and most certainly don't fulfil this criteria.

(b) "have a fixed distinctive sign recognisable at a distance." That is to say that they must have a recognisable symbol, flag or colour that marks them out from both the opposition and the civilian population. At present the SIA operate in civilian clothes and fly the old Syrian flag which has three stars rather then two. That is simply not good enough to count as "distinctive."

(c) "openly carry their arms." This is more then simply having their fighter carrying their rifles when they're out and about. They must store all their arms including heavy weapons and ammunition in clearly marked military positions that are distinct from the civilian population. At present the SIA hide their weapons and fighters in civilian homes, hospitals and Mosques leaving their opponents with no option other then to attack those civilian homes, hospitals and Mosques.

(d) "conduct operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war." That is to say they must comply with all other parts of the Geneva Conventions and international conventions. For example they are not allowed to hide amongst civilian crowds in order to attack military positions nor fire into civilian crowds in order to generate black propaganda.

To my mind this fourth criteria is the most important criteria and creates a strong moral argument why no mercy should be shown to unlawful combatants. If people understand that if they break the laws of war then no-one will come to their aid and there is no limit to what can be done to them as punishment fewer people will be prepared to break those laws and we can avoid truly horrific scenes like the ones we've seen in places like Sierra Leone.