The transitional phase, after the fall of the Assad regime, faces many challenges related to the fate of the fallen system and how to hold its officials accountable, especially those who have stained their hands with the blood of the Syrian people and corrupted public funds. It also involves addressing immediate solutions necessary to secure the needs and safety of society. This phase encompasses various tasks, such as drafting a new constitution and legislations that guarantee human rights and citizenship, establishing an independent judiciary, free media, comprehensive development, and honest institutions to ensure security. The greatest threats come from ideological blindness on one side and sectarian intolerance on the other, which portend the emergence of explosive centers for sectarian, religious, or national conflicts, allowing violence to escalate and jeopardizing the entire democratic transition project amid chaos and civil strife.

The goal and methodology of transitional justice institutions in Syria is to strive for justice, address the legacy of human rights violations, and assist the Syrian people in transitioning in a direct, peaceful, and non-violent manner. This involves pursuing a dual goal through the judiciary: accountability for past crimes and preventing new crimes from occurring, based on a strategy that focuses on rebuilding a homeland for the future that includes all components of the Syrian people, founded on respecting human rights, democratic mechanisms, and the rule of law. From this perspective, the importance of building transitional justice institutions arises to address the remnants of the past, as one of the remedial recipes for dealing with the aftermath of the previous oppressive regime.

The forms of this justice vary according to the contexts that define them and the expected objectives. Its mechanisms typically focus on establishing truth-finding commissions regarding serious human rights violations and revealing them in detail to the public, or through judicial approaches and prosecuting offenders before local or international courts, or via providing material compensation (financial aid, social and educational and psychological and health services) and moral reparations (offering official apologies to victims and preserving memory), and remedying the damage inflicted on victims due to their tragedies and sufferings, or through enacting reforms that strengthen the state of institutions, consolidate the rule of law, and overcome the negatives and pressures of the past.

Here, one can address the issue of amnesty and its role in establishing national reconciliation, not to overshadow justice. Utilizing this path is necessary, but it cannot be general; rather, it must be limited and specific, used precisely to close files that have been resolved and reconciled, not a blanket "forgiveness of the past."

Numerous research groups operating in this field have identified the most prominent steps advised to follow, taking into consideration the specifics of each case in detailed and procedural matters. Files and documents held by judicial and security authorities must be secured to serve as a supporting source in the process of building the mechanisms to commence work.

Thus, during the transitional phase, many critical questions will occupy us in Syria, the most important of which are: What types of crimes and violations should be held accountable? What levels of responsibility are there? What nature of responsibility: is it criminal or civil? What time frames are needed for the accountability process?

Transitional justice relies on a set of mechanisms, including judicial mechanisms to pursue those who commit serious crimes and hold them accountable, as they bear personal/individual criminal responsibility for their criminal actions, and non-judicial mechanisms that support and complement judicial mechanisms, such as truth and reconciliation commissions, truth-finding commissions, remedying harm and/or compensating victims, reforming institutions, honoring the memory of victims, among others.

The work of the transitional justice institution can be divided into five axes:
1. A fund for compensating physical and material harm to affected citizens.
2. Establishing special courts independent from ordinary judiciary, a court in Damascus for major cases, and branch courts in every province to address crimes committed during the events. Judges in these courts should be known for their integrity, impartiality, and independence.
3. Forming commissions for civil peace and national reconciliation, comprising respected cultural, scientific, legal, artistic, religious, and social figures, to engage with areas that have experienced religious, sectarian, or national conflicts to soothe emotions, establish peace, dispel doubts, and restore trust among community components. Their tasks should also include contributing to investigating the missing, kidnapped, and detained individuals and returning them to their families. Additionally, they should work on establishing committees and associations for psychological support and treatment for victims of violations.
4. Establishing media offices tasked with conducting a comprehensive campaign to explain the concept of transitional justice, its means, and its role, managed by legal and social experts, supported by committees of trained young volunteers to convey the idea of transitional justice to all citizens and assist them in interacting with its bodies, building trust in them, submitting their requests, and following them up.


Dr. Abdullah Turkmani