About 16 Million Syrian Citizens are Suffering as a Result of the Syrian Regime’s Control Over Official Documents

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The Hague – The Syrian Network for Human Rights:

The Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR) today released a report entitled, ‘About 16 Million Syrian Citizens are Suffering as a Result of the Syrian Regime’s Control Over Official documents’, which sheds light on the Syrian regime’s exploitation of citizens’ need, and use of state documents as an instrument of war against dissidents.

The 38-page report notes that that the regime controls the process of issuing those documents in an unlawful and discriminatory manner, abusing its power and state resources as a means of attaining further political and economic gains for itself in a deliberate and calculated manner by disregarding the proper role of its government and authorities at the expense of the people’s interests. In other words, the regime has been using the state’s apparatus and resources to blackmail Syrian citizens and cruelly impose total control over them to force them to submit to its rule. Even though obtaining documents is one of the most basic rights for the citizens of any state worldwide, and is usually a process that requires minimal costs and straightforward procedures, the regime has exploited Syrian citizens’ essential need for government documents, imposing excessively costly fees for these documents relative to Syrian citizens’ income, to use this money to fund its war on the Syrian people and further its own interests.

As the report further reveals, the Syrian regime has enabled and supported its oppressive security agencies’ intrusion into state institutions. These agencies have far-reaching powers, including the authority to grant or deny official documents to citizens, through imposing a requirement for applicants to obtain security clearance before they can obtain many documents or conduct transactions, including those related to properties, such as selling and renting houses and shops. The same applies to domestic and international power of attorneys, which are used in founding, entering into, or withdrawing from partnerships. This constitutes a blatant violation of the Syrian constitution that guarantees the protection of private ownership and people’s freedom to dispose of their properties. The requirement for security clearance is also imposed as a requirement for obtaining many other documents and conducting a variety of transactions, including, inter alia, death certificates, inheritance settlements, use of commercial and residential establishments, pensions, adjusting company contracts, withdrawing/depositing money in bank accounts. The report stresses that the funds charged for these security clearances have become a source of income for security personnel who refuse to issue them without first receiving large sums of money in the form of bribes.

The report identifies seven main groups primarily targeted by such exploitation, being forced to pay additional sums of money for brokers if they wish to obtain documents. The first group consists of individuals wanted or sought for prosecution by the regime security apparatus in connection with their political views or due to their security status, particularly political activists and humanitarian workers. Many people who fall into this category are forced to pay sums of money, rising to as much as thousands of dollars in some cases depending on the type of document and the security status of the person concerned; they have no choice but to pay these bribes if they wish to obtain documents, otherwise they face the risk of being denied any official documents.

The second group consists of former detainees who were arbitrarily arrested and the families of forcibly disappeared persons, who are denied documents in many cases unless they pay large sums of money in the form of bribes and fees to state employees and brokers simply to be granted what should be their fundamental human rights to receive their official documents.

The third group is university students and graduates, who are also exploited in the course of their efforts to obtain their basic education or university degree certificates. Fourth are property owners who fall victim to the regime security agencies’ exploitation, with these agencies having consolidated control over the process of issuing official documents, as mentioned above.

Fifth are residents of the areas that saw so-called settlements with the regime. In many cases, residents of these areas are denied official documents as a form of punishment for having supported the popular uprising against the regime. Sixth are individuals wanted for mandatory or reserve military service, who also exist at the mercy of regime security agencies. In addition to these six groups, the seventh group is made up of various vulnerable groups who are routinely exploited, such as ethnic minorities, Syrians wishing to obtain or renew their travel documents whether in Syria or abroad, Syrians who left Syria irregularly and wish to settle their security status with the regime, and other groups.

The report concludes that the struggle to obtain and/or renew official documents has become a source of widespread suffering affecting all Syrians regardless of their political stance or geographical location. In total, about 16 million Syrians have suffered violations by the regime related to acquiring official documents both in Syria and abroad.

The report also sheds light on the problematic issue of obtaining death certificates for victims of extrajudicial killing, and of arbitrary arrest and enforced disappearance. In these cases, the regime tries to conceal its crimes by refusing to issue documents to these victims’ bereaved families. The report also discusses the multi-faceted nature of the suffering experienced by these individuals and families due to their inability to obtain this document.

Furthermore, the report stresses that the regime’s rampant corruption undermines the credibility of Syrian official state documents, which have been turned into commodities for purchase and sale in black markets run by brokers and corrupt officials working at government departments, as well as forgers who claim to be brokers able to obtain official documents from regime institutions in order to extort money from people needing these documents, who subsequently only receive worthless, forged, unrecognized documents.

Finally, the report summarizes the ramifications for Syrians of the lack or loss of official documents; these include being denied the right to education, healthcare, and humanitarian aid, denial of property rights, and denial of the right to free movement. Another problematic issue that has arisen in relation to the lack or loss of official documents is the increasing numbers of undocumented children or children of unknown lineage. On this subject, the report explains that the absence of official documents may potentially lead to these children being denied Syrian nationality, and consequently the right to vote and participate in future political life. Additionally, the report sheds light on a number of female-specific issues, particularly those affecting the wives of detainees and forcibly disappeared persons.

The report calls on the UN and the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) to secure civil documents for refugees to prevent citizens from having to deal with brokers and pay exorbitant fees, to provide legal assistance to refugees who have lost their civil documents and are unable to obtain replacements, to establish a neutral mechanism to facilitate certifying documents in the various areas of control in Syria, to mediate between the Syrian regime and opposition factions on the mutual recognition of documents, and to advocate for universal birth registration by launching a campaign to ensure the registration of all Syrian children born in areas of displacement and asylum.

The report further calls on states hosting Syrians to adopt flexible documentation policies, to facilitate the documentation of marriages and deaths in host countries without requiring refugees to engage with the Syrian regime, to improve birth documentation, and to provide legal residency options by developing pathways for obtaining legal residency that do not require documents from the Syrian regime.

The report also makes a number of additional recommendations.