German Court Overturns Appeal for Releasing Ex-Syria Intelligence Officer

A satellite view of part of the Sednaya prison complex near Damascus, Syria. Department of State/via REUTERS
A satellite view of part of the Sednaya prison complex near Damascus, Syria. Department of State/via REUTERS
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German Court Overturns Appeal for Releasing Ex-Syria Intelligence Officer

A satellite view of part of the Sednaya prison complex near Damascus, Syria. Department of State/via REUTERS
A satellite view of part of the Sednaya prison complex near Damascus, Syria. Department of State/via REUTERS

The German Federal Court on Tuesday decided to send back a former Syrian intelligence officer in prison after having been acquitted in an earlier appeal, Deutsche Presse-Agentur (DPA) reported.

According to a German media outlet, the court overturned a previous decision to release the man from prison, issued back in May, and reinstated the February arrest warrant.

Strong suspicions still surround the defendant, who is facing charges of committing major crimes against humanity. On the other hand, the court amended grounds backing the arrest warrant from only “killing two people,” to also “torturing at least 30 others.”

On February 12, the 42-year-old suspect was arrested along with another Syrian man in on suspicion of committing crimes in Syria regime prison wards dedicated for torture.

This arrest provoked a stir at the time, as it was the first time German investigators had addressed war crimes in Syria. In parallel, a third Syrian intelligence officer was arrested in France.



IAEA: Iran's Uranium Enrichment Rolls On

FILE - The flag of the International Atomic Energy Agency flies in front of its headquarters during an IAEA Board of Governors meeting in Vienna, Austria, on Feb. 6, 2023.  (AP Photo/Heinz-Peter Bader, File)
FILE - The flag of the International Atomic Energy Agency flies in front of its headquarters during an IAEA Board of Governors meeting in Vienna, Austria, on Feb. 6, 2023. (AP Photo/Heinz-Peter Bader, File)
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IAEA: Iran's Uranium Enrichment Rolls On

FILE - The flag of the International Atomic Energy Agency flies in front of its headquarters during an IAEA Board of Governors meeting in Vienna, Austria, on Feb. 6, 2023.  (AP Photo/Heinz-Peter Bader, File)
FILE - The flag of the International Atomic Energy Agency flies in front of its headquarters during an IAEA Board of Governors meeting in Vienna, Austria, on Feb. 6, 2023. (AP Photo/Heinz-Peter Bader, File)

Iran's production of highly enriched uranium continues and it has not improved cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog despite a resolution demanding this at the agency's last board meeting, watchdog reports seen by Reuters showed on Thursday.

Despite the resolution passed at the last quarterly meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency's 35-nation Board of Governors in June, nuclear diplomacy has largely been on hold with the election last month of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and the US presidential election due in November.
"The (IAEA) Director General (Rafael Grossi) expresses the hope that his initial exchange with President Pezeshkian will be followed by an early visit to Iran and the establishment of a fluid, constructive dialogue that swiftly leads to concrete results," said one of the two confidential, quarterly IAEA reports sent to member states on Thursday.

There has been no progress in the past quarter on several long-standing issues that have soured relations between the IAEA and Tehran, including Iran's barring of IAEA inspectors specialized in enrichment and Iran's failure to explain uranium traces at undeclared sites, the reports showed.

At the same time, Iran has added cascades, or clusters, of centrifuges, machines that refine uranium, at its main enrichment sites in Natanz and Fordow.
It has installed eight more cascades of advanced IR-6 centrifuges at Fordow, a site dug into a mountain, bringing the total there to 10, although the new ones had not yet been brought online, meaning they are not yet enriching uranium hexafluoride (UF6) gas, one report showed. Iran's stock of uranium in UF6 form enriched to up to 60% purity, close to the roughly 90% of weapons grade, grew by an estimated 22.6 kg to 164.7 kg, one of the reports said.
According to an IAEA yardstick, that is 2 kg short of being enough, in theory, if enriched further, for four nuclear bombs. By the same measure Iran now has enough uranium enriched to up to 20% purity, if enriched further, for six bombs.