Exclusive – Idlib Truce and Fear of Coronavirus Spreading in Syria’s Quagmire

A health worker tests an internally displaced Syrian boy as part of security measures to avoid coronavirus, in Azaz, Syria, March 11, 2020. (Reuters)
A health worker tests an internally displaced Syrian boy as part of security measures to avoid coronavirus, in Azaz, Syria, March 11, 2020. (Reuters)
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Exclusive – Idlib Truce and Fear of Coronavirus Spreading in Syria’s Quagmire

A health worker tests an internally displaced Syrian boy as part of security measures to avoid coronavirus, in Azaz, Syria, March 11, 2020. (Reuters)
A health worker tests an internally displaced Syrian boy as part of security measures to avoid coronavirus, in Azaz, Syria, March 11, 2020. (Reuters)

March marked the lowest number of casualties in Syria in nine years of war. “Only 103” civilians were killed, half in air strikes and shelling and the rest in bombings, mines and assassinations. The drop in figures, which is not low at all by the standards of other countries, to half of what it was in February can be attributed to a number of reasons. It can be due to ending the pursuit of the “military victory” as much so as the concern over the spread of the novel coronavirus in devastated Syria:

1- Russian-Turkish ceasefire
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan struck the truce in Moscow on March 5. It put on hold regime plans, with Russian support, for a widescale offensive against the northwestern Idlib province that had led to the displacement of nearly one million people since December. The deal included setting up a safe zone along the Aleppo-Latakia highway and deploying Russian-Turkish patrols. The execution was not as easy as predicted because the patrols were met with local protests, forcing Ankara to mobilize its own patrols along the international highway. Damascus vowed to retaliate by launching a military offensive, citing Ankara’s lack of commitment to pledges, a threat that did not sit well with the Kremlin.

2- Russian intervention
A week after striking the Moscow deal, Putin dispatched Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu to Damascus to deliver a message to the Syrian leadership on the need to commit to the agreement and refrain from launching military operations in Idlib. With this move, Moscow was seeking to give Ankara more time to fulfill its pledges. Moreover, Putin believes that maintaining relations with Turkey is more important than the situation in Idlib, at least at the moment. This all does not mean that he will cease exerting pressure on Erdogan.

3- UN call for a ceasefire
UN chief Antonio Guterres had called for a global ceasefire as the world comes to grips with the coronavirus outbreak. His remarks were followed by a similar plea by UN special envoy to Syria, Geir Pedersen, who urged Syrian parties to adopt a comprehensive and immediate truce so that attention can be focused on fighting the pandemic.

4- Coronavirus
Syria is more vulnerable than other countries to the outbreak given the devastation caused by years of war and the decimation of its healthcare system. Realizing the danger, local and foreign powers are prioritizing the virus fight at the moment. Some foreign forces are, however, still trying to exploit the fragile truce to boost their military positions, see the ongoing Syrian, Turkish and Iranian reinforcements on all fronts, but at the same time, they are preoccupied by their own country’s fight against the outbreak. Shoigu underlined this point during his Damascus visit when he demanded that the regime seriously and transparently handle the outbreak. It was no coincidence that his office circulated a video of him undergoing a virus test on his flight back to Moscow.

5- Disengagement
Russia and the United States are still committed to a military deal that prevents their armies from clashing in the region east of the Euphrates River, an issue noted by Pedersen during a briefing before the UN Security Council just days ago. “I appreciate the fact that arrangements between key stakeholders in the northeast, including Russia, Turkey and the United States, as well as Syrian parties, also continue to broadly hold,” he said.

6- Local forces
The regime, Idlib factions and the autonomous Kurdish administration, have imposed curfews in areas under their control and suspended fighting as a preventive measure against the coronavirus. Pedersen noted this, saying: “The Syrian government has taken increasingly significant steps to counter COVID-19. Large parts of the country are now under varying degrees of curfew, with public spaces closed and healthcare systems preparing to the extent possible. Meanwhile, the Syrian Opposition Coalition and other de facto authorities in areas outside government control have also taken steps. Syrian civil society, including women-led organizations, are also mobilizing against this threat. I note these efforts and urge the Syrian government and all de facto authorities to be transparent in their reporting on how COVID-19 is affecting all Syrians.”

Despite these efforts, Pedersen warned that the situation could boil over. “In both the northeast and northwest, there is a real risk of hostilities resuming,” he told the council. “If that happened, the pre-existing dangers to civilians would be multiplied by the pandemic and the virus would spread like wildfire, with devastating effects for the Syrian people – humanitarian, societal and economic. It could rebound across international borders.”



Things to Know About the UN Special Rapporteur Sanctioned by the US

Francesca Albanese, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, talks to the media during a press conference at the European headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, July 11, 2023. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP, File)
Francesca Albanese, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, talks to the media during a press conference at the European headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, July 11, 2023. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP, File)
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Things to Know About the UN Special Rapporteur Sanctioned by the US

Francesca Albanese, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, talks to the media during a press conference at the European headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, July 11, 2023. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP, File)
Francesca Albanese, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, talks to the media during a press conference at the European headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, July 11, 2023. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP, File)

A UN special rapporteur was sanctioned by the United States over her work as an independent investigator scrutinizing human rights abuses in the Palestinian territories, a high-profile role in a network of experts appointed by the United Nations Human Rights Council.

Francesca Albanese is among the experts chosen by the 47-member council in Geneva. They report to the body as a means of monitoring human rights records in various countries and the global observance of specific rights.

Special rapporteurs don't represent the UN and have no formal authority. Still, their reports can step up pressure on countries, while their findings inform prosecutors at the International Criminal Court and other venues working on transnational justice cases.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement announcing sanctions against Albanese on Wednesday that she “has spewed unabashed antisemitism, expressed support for terrorism, and open contempt for the United States, Israel and the West.”

Albanese said Thursday that she believed the sanctions were “calculated to weaken my mission.” She said at a news conference in Slovenia that “I’ll continue to do what I have to do.”

She questioned why she had been sanctioned — “for having exposed a genocide? For having denounced the system? They never challenged me on the facts.”

The UN high commissioner for human rights, Volker Türk, called for a “prompt reversal” of the US sanctions. He added that “even in face of fierce disagreement, UN member states should engage substantively and constructively, rather than resort to punitive measures.”

Prominent expert

Albanese, an Italian human rights lawyer, has developed an unusually high profile as the special rapporteur for the West Bank and Gaza, a post she has held since May 2022.

Last week, she named several large US companies among those aiding Israel as it fights a war with Hamas in Gaza, saying her report “shows why Israel’s genocide continues: because it is lucrative for many.”

Israel has long had a rocky relationship with the Human Rights Council, Albanese and previous rapporteurs, accusing them of bias. It has refused to cooperate with a special “Commission of Inquiry” established following a 2021 conflict with Hamas.

Albanese has been vocal about what she describes as a genocide by Israel against Palestinians in Gaza. Israel and the US, which provides military support to its close ally, have strongly denied the accusation.

‘Nothing justifies what Israel is doing’

In recent weeks, Albanese issued a series of letters urging other countries to pressure Israel, including through sanctions, to end its deadly bombardment of the Gaza Strip. She also has been a strong supporter of arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court against Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for allegations of war crimes.

Albanese said at a news conference last year that she has “always been attacked since the very beginning of my mandate,” adding that criticism wouldn't force her to step down.

“It just infuriates me, it pisses me off, of course it does, but then it creates even more pressure not to step back,” she said. “Human rights work is first and foremost amplifying the voice of people who are not heard.”

She added that “of course, one condemned Hamas — how not to condemn Hamas? But at the same time, nothing justifies what Israel is doing.”

Albanese became an affiliate scholar at the Institute for the Study of International Migration at Georgetown University in 2015, and has taught and lectured in recent years at various universities in Europe and the Middle East. She also has written publications and opinions on Palestinian issues.

Albanese worked between 2003 and 2013 with arms of the UN, including the legal affairs department of the UN Palestinian aid agency, UNRWA, and the UN human rights office, according to her biography on the Georgetown website.

She was in Washington between 2013 and 2015 and worked for an American nongovernmental organization, Project Concern International, as an adviser on protection issues during an Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

Member of a small group

Albanese is one of 14 current council-appointed experts on specific countries and territories.

Special rapporteurs, who document rights violations and abuses, usually have renewable mandates of one year and generally work without the support of the country under investigation. There are rapporteurs for Afghanistan, Belarus, Burundi, Cambodia, North Korea, Eritrea, Iran, Myanmar, Russia and Syria.

There also are three country-specific “independent experts,” a role more focused on technical assistance, for the Central African Republic, Mali and Somalia.

Additionally, there are several dozen “thematic mandates,” which task experts or working groups to analyze phenomena related to particular human rights. Those include special rapporteurs on “torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment,” the human rights of migrants, the elimination of discrimination against people affected by leprosy and the sale, sexual exploitation and sexual abuse of children.