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U.N. Says Syria Execution Video Shows Apparent War Crime U.N. Says Execution Video From Syria Shows Apparent War Crime
(about 14 hours later)
GENEVA — The United Nations said on Friday that a new video from war-torn Syria circulating on the Internet and seeming to show antigovernment fighters armed with rifles kicking and summarily executing a group of captured soldiers or militiamen could, if verified, represent evidence of a war crime to prosecute the perpetrators. GENEVA — The United Nations said on Friday that a new video from Syria circulating on the Internet that appears to show antigovernment fighters kicking and summarily executing a group of frightened captive soldiers or militiamen could, if verified, represent evidence of a war crime to prosecute the perpetrators.
“It looks very likely that this is a war crime, another one,” Rupert Colville, a spokesman for the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, told journalists in Geneva, where the commission has its headquarters. The video, which first appeared on Thursday, generated widespread attention internationally and provoked debate among insurgents and their sympathizers inside Syria. The video also illustrated what rights activists called a distressing trend of atrocities committed by both sides in the 20-month-old conflict.
 United Nations investigators had already collected evidence of war crimes and crimes against humanity by government and rebel forces that could support prosecutions of those responsible by national or international tribunals, Mr. Colville said. The new video, if verified, could be part of that evidence, he added. “It looks very likely that this is a war crime, another one,” Rupert Colville, a spokesman for Navi Pillay, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, told journalists in Geneva, the commission’s headquarters.
 “There should be no illusion that accountability will follow,” Mr. Colville said. United Nations investigators had already collected evidence of war crimes and crimes against humanity by government and rebel forces in Syria that could support prosecutions of those responsible by national or international tribunals, Mr. Colville said. The new video, assuming its authenticity were proved, could be part of that evidence, he said. “There should be no illusion that accountability will follow,” Mr. Colville said.
His remarks followed similar assessments on Thursday, when the video began circulating, by human rights groups who also called it evidence of a war crime and another indication that both sides were increasingly committing atrocities. Thousands of videos depicting violence and combat in Syria have been posted on the Internet since the conflict began, mostly by antigovernment activists aiming to vilify the behavior of the Syrian military and pro-government militia known as the shabiha. Many videos cannot be independently corroborated, and experts are cautious about drawing conclusions from video that could have been digitally fabricated or altered.
The video, which could not be authenticated independently, appeared to have been made in Saraqeb, a town in Idlib Province in northern Syria that has been the scene of particularly brutal fighting between rebels and loyalists in the 20-month-old conflict. But videos are among the few ways to obtain information and assess the course of the conflict in a country where outside news media coverage is severely restricted and dangerous. YouTube footage of weapons in the conflict, for example, has revealed the use of widely outlawed cluster bomb munitions dropped by the Syrian Air Force as well as the emergence of smuggled shoulder-fired, heat-seeking missiles in the insurgent arsenals.
In the video, 10 prisoners are shown being forced by their captors to lie next to or atop one another in what remained of a largely destroyed structure that may have been a military checkpoint. The antigovernment fighters, whose precise identities or affiliations were not clear, yell “Allah Akhbar!” or “God is great!” as they kick and herd the prisoners into a pile. Then they open fire. The video purporting to show the extrajudicial killings of loyalist soldiers appeared to have been made at the Hamcho military checkpoint in Saraqeb, a town in Idlib Province in northern Syria that has been the scene of particularly brutal fighting.
“This shocking footage depicts a potential war crime in progress and demonstrates an utter disregard for international humanitarian law by the armed group in question,” said Ann Harrison, deputy director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa program. In the video, captors force 10 prisoners, some pleading for their lives, to lie next to or atop one another. The antigovernment fighters, whose precise identities or affiliations were not clear, yell “Allah Akhbar!” or “God is great!” A few even parade before the camera as others kick and herd the prisoners into a pile before shooting them from multiple directions.
Ms. Harrison said, “We will continue to investigate the incident and once again urge all sides to respect the laws of war and to refrain from torturing, ill-treating or killing their prisoners.” Ann Harrison, deputy director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa program, said the video demonstrated an “utter disregard for international humanitarian law by the armed group in question.”
While much of the video and other evidence filtering out of the Syria conflict has depicted government atrocities against civilians, increasingly there have been instances of abuses against government forces and their sympathizers. On July 31, videos posted on YouTube showed rebels in the northern city of Aleppo executing by ad hoc firing squad several members of a prominent family with close ties to President Bashar al-Assad. The victims died in a 45-second hail of bullets after they were forced to sit along the wall of a local school decorated with a mural of Mickey Mouse and SpongeBob SquarePants. The killers apparently did not know, or did not care, about an important legal change in the definition of the Syrian conflict decreed in July by the International Committee of the Red Cross. It said Syria was engrossed in a civil war, subject to the Geneva Convention on the treatment of victims of war. Under that change, the execution of a soldier not in combat and with no means of protection is considered a war crime.

Nick Cumming-Bruce reported from Geneva, and Rick Gladstone from New York.

The video from Saraqib provoked a certain amount of protest within Syria itself, with some activists saying the killings did not represent the values that inspired their revolution against four decades of repression by the family of President Bashar al-Assad.
“We don’t want those who are liberating us from killers to resemble them and take on their values,” Iyas Kadouni, an activist in Saraqib, wrote on his Facebook page.
Despite the death and pain caused by pro-Assad soldiers, he wrote: “We are asking for a change for the better and to liberate the country from murderers. I’m not being insensitive about what we’ve all been feeling because of the innocent blood that has been spilled, but this not how we obtain our rights.”
Mr. Kadouni said he had received e-mailed death threats in response to his Facebook comment, warning him he was “playing with fire.”
Some rebel military commanders said such encounters were inevitable given the tensions of warfare.
“I cannot stop these angry fighters,” said one commander in Saraqib reached by Skype. “How can I control a fighter who lost a brother or father in front of his own eyes?”
He also said the executions might have reflected what he described as a logistics issue — the fighters have enough trouble housing and feeding themselves without trying to provide for prisoners. Several weeks ago, they simply released 60 prisoners for this reason, he said, but they inevitably find themselves fighting the same men again.
Commanders not directly involved in the fighting said the world had to take into consideration that Syria had not been respecting global standards on issues like prisoners since the Assad family’s ascent to power, if not since the nation’s independence after World War II.
“We are a people who have been oppressed for 60 years,” said Abu Thabet, the nickname for a Free Syrian Army fighter in Aleppo. ”There is a lot of repressed tension inside people,” he said. “Is it possible for a population that has been living in complete ignorance and corruption for 60 years to reach the highest level of awareness within two years?”

Nick Cumming-Bruce reported from Geneva, and Rick Gladstone from New York. Reporting was contributed by Neil MacFarquhar, Hwaida Saad and Hania Mourtada from Beirut, Lebanon.