Normalization and Sanctions. Question and Answer
Q: Is it beneficial for any country to normalize ties with the Syrian regime? Can countries ensure that their demands are met by normalizing relations with the Syrian regime?
A: Normalizing relations with the Syrian regime, which is responsible for massive human rights atrocities, will only serve to legitimize its actions and embolden its oppressive practices and could encourage other autocrats and dictators to undermine the rules-based international order.
The regime frequently shows a willingness to address its human rights issues during negotiations, using this pretense to achieve normalization. In reality, these false promises have never become true, as seen after normalizations with the Arab League. Any nation that normalizes with this regime accepts its actions and is complicit in the killing, oppression and injustice of innocents.
Global leaders must not normalize relations with a criminal regime until the demands to respect and protect the Syrian people’s civil, social, and political rights are fully met and the perpetrators are held accountable.
Lifting sanctions and normalizing relations with the regime will only embolden both the Syrian regime and its allies to continue committing war crimes and crimes against humanity and could encourage other autocrats and dictators to undermine the rules-based international order.
Human rights must not be a mere pretext; they must be the central and non-negotiable demand.
Q: As many countries continue normalizing with the Syrian regime, what is the fate of refugees? Is it safe for refugees to return to Syria?
A: Nowhere in Syria is safe for Syrian refugees to return to, they will face immediate and inevitable danger, according to reports from multiple credible human rights organizations, such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.
Syria is a state of torture, with over 100,000 people detained or forcibly disappeared by the Assad regime. Recent reports reveal that refugees deported from neighboring countries to Syria have faced detention, torture, forced conscription, and, in some cases, even death.
Syria remains under the control of the same authoritarian Assad regime responsible for detaining, torturing, and killing millions of its citizens, as well as displacing over 12 million people.
As long as Assad remains in power and the international community does not prioritize a political solution to implement systemic change, returning refugees to a country where their lives are in danger is a violation of international law.
Q: Do sanctions on the Syrian regime impact Syrian civilians?
A: The reality is that the humanitarian crisis in Syria was produced and has been maintained by Assad himself. By manipulating the currency exchange rate, the regime steals nearly 51 cents of every dollar of international aid meant for Syrians. The regime also sells humanitarian aid on the black market and deliberately blocks them from reaching civilians in non-regime-controlled areas.
Sanctions are placed strictly on those individuals or entities directly perpetrating or associated with heinous war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Unintended consequences result from agencies’ overcompliance and misunderstanding of sanctions guidelines, which could be addressed through the issuance of appropriate licenses and exceptions. Additionally, the Syrian regime exacerbates poverty and suffering by blaming sanctions while exploiting the country’s resources, mismanaging its wealth, and failing to provide essential necessities like water and electricity.
Q: Should sanctions be lifted?
A: Lifting sanctions would effectively reward the Assad regime for perpetuating its ongoing machinery of death and committing severe human rights abuses.
Sanctions are designed to alter the behavior of perpetrators and exert pressure on authoritarian regimes to address the demands of the international community and the Syrian population.
To achieve this goal, global leaders must prioritize effective political solutions to remedy this ongoing crisis rather than pursuing normalization with a criminal regime.
Sanctions must be enforced and strengthened to prevent evasion and ensure they fulfill their intended purpose: applying pressure on perpetrators to implement systemic change. Sanctions should not be removed but improved to address loopholes that criminals use.
Governments must work harder to ensure that the complexity of compliance with sanction laws and regulations for organizations and businesses does not result in over-compliance.
What is over compliance? When compliance requirements are complex or unclear, organizations may resort to over-compliance as a precaution to meet regulations and avoid penalties. This excessive caution can inadvertently affect sectors or groups within Syrian society that were not the intended targets of the sanctions.
What governments and companies can do is dedicate more resources in training and developing programs to enhance the understanding of sanctions screening and how to comply with sanctions without over complying.
Q: Why has the Assad regime turned to producing and exporting Captagon drugs in recent years?
A: The production of Captagon has become the Syrian regime’s primary method to bypass sanctions and finance its human rights atrocities in Syria. For this reason, SETF recently pushed for the passage of the Captagon bill to disrupt and dismantle Bashar Al-Assad’s narcotics production and trafficking.
Captagon is an illegal and addictive amphetamine popular in many Arab countries, with effects not unlike those of similar drugs popular in the U.S. Over the past decade, captagon manufacturing and commerce linked to the Syrian regime have proliferated in Syria and grown into a multibillion-dollar operation. The Bashar al-Assad regime has relied on illicit drug trafficking to bypass sanctions imposed through the 2019 Caesar Act to fund its machinery of death.