Syria has begun its first public trial of officials who served under longtime leader Bashar al-Assad, 15 years after the start of the civil war.
Syria put the first Assad-era official on trial as proceedings opened in Damascus on Sunday, April 26, 2026, for Atef Najib, the former head of political security in southern Syria’s Deraa province.
Crowds gathered outside the court on Sunday in celebration, as families of victims, including some from Deraa, attended the session.
Najib, who is a cousin of al-Assad, was the sole defendant in court for Sunday’s preparatory session of the trial set to continue next month. According to Syria’s state-run news agency, he is accused of overseeing a violent crackdown on protesters there during the 2011 uprising, and faces charges related to “crimes against the Syrian people.”
Najib oversaw political security in Deraa when teenagers who scrawled antigovernment graffiti on a school wall in Deraa were arrested and tortured, in a case that became a catalyst for the broader uprising.
Further protests were met by a brutal government crackdown and spiralled into a 14-year civil war that ended with al-Assad’s overthrow in December 2024 in a lightning rebel offensive. Al-Assad then fled to Russia, and most members of his inner circle have also escaped Syria.
One of the plaintiffs, Ramez Abu Nabbout, said his brother, a father of three, was killed when security forces opened fire on protesters at Daraa’s Omari Mosque. “He was a civilian and peaceful, but Atef Najib greeted peaceful (protesters) with gunfire,” he said. “Of course we hope Atef Najib will be quickly convicted and will get the most serious sentence, which is the death penalty,” he added.
Charged in their absence are Al-Assad and his brother, Maher, former Commander of the Syrian military’s 4th Armoured Division. Along with other former high-ranking security officials also charged in absentia, they are accused of killings, torture, extortion and drug trafficking.
Public Trial Aimed At Ensuring Transparency
A spokesman for Syria’s Justice Ministry said that holding the trial in public was important to ensure transparency and judicial independence as part of the transitional justice process.
The government of interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa has faced criticism over delays in launching a promised transitional justice process following the civil war, in which an estimated half a million people were killed. However, authorities now appear to be moving more aggressively to prosecute officials linked to al-Assad.
On Friday, Syrian authorities arrested former intelligence officer Amjad Youssef, the main suspect accused of the 2013 Tadamon massacre in Damascus, when at least 41 people were killed.
Youssef was arrested following a “tightly executed security operation”, the interior ministry said, adding that surveillance and tracking operations were employed for days across the Al-Ghab Plain in Hama.
Youssef went into hiding after the fall of Assad in December 2024. An intelligence officer during the leadership of former Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, Youssef was responsible for security operations in southern Damascus during the Syrian uprising.
He has been accused of numerous crimes against civilians. In 2022, a leaked video appeared to show Youssef shooting civilians who had been detained and blindfolded, with their hands bound.
A military recruit filmed the incident and leaked the video, date-stamped on the day of the Tadamon massacre – April 16, 2013, after fleeing war-torn Syria. The release of the video footage triggered an outcry, with some families recognising their relatives being killed in the video.
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