2022-03-16
40 分钟Hello, welcome to Outlook.
I'm Joe Fidgeon.
Eleven years on from the start of the Syrian civil war, there are the first glimmers of justice being served on those who tortured and murdered civilians on behalf of the state.
A court in Germany a couple of months ago handed down a life sentence for crimes against humanity to a former colonel who ran a detention center in Damascus.
It was the first trial of its kind under a law that allows countries to prosecute crimes not connected to their own people or territory.
Watching closely was Khalid Helmi, a 30 something Syrian woman and member of Families for Freedom, a movement of wives, sisters, daughters, mothers of individuals detained by the authorities.
A lot of our friends were there and they've been waiting to hear the judgment.
So we were on the WhatsApp group and they sent us the photos and they said, he is sentenced for this and this and that.
And everyone was just like crying, you know, it's not the utmost.
It's not Bashar Al Assad, it's not the Syrian government.
He is not a major perpetrator, you know what I mean?
But he was part of that system.
And I was happy, not for myself, but I was happy for all the witnesses, like the eyewitnesses who said that he was there when I was detained.
So maybe part of their very personal justice happened to them.
But then I.
I was not super optimistic about anything else, to be honest.
It's not the justice that we are seeking, but part of it.
Marie Claire magazine once called Khaloud the bravest woman in the world.
She's put her own safety on the line to spread the word about what's been happening to Syrians who oppose the authority of the president, Bashar Al Assad.
We spoke on a video link from Turkey, where Khaloud is now in exile.