In his latest interview with foreign media, President Assad has repeatedly denied any regime abuse of Syrian civilians, blaming all violence and destruction on “terrorists”.
Alongside the Russian political and military intervention supporting his rule, Assad has hosted a series of discussions with overseas broadcasters and newspapers.
Pressed by the Dutch channel NOS about documentation of the regime’s abuse and killing of detainees — including tens of thousands of photographs from a military photographer who defected in 2013 — Assad maintained, “How can you have public support if you are torturing your people?”
However, in response to the latest report from Human Rights Watch, the President did not directly confront the testimony of scores of former detainees and relatives of those who died. Instead, he said:
You mentioned the shelling of Damascus a few days go, and that happens every few days, killing many civilians, innocent civilians. Did they mention anything about this in the reports? You have many pieces of evidence that’s been published by the terrorists on the Internet, photos, videos, about torturing, about killing, about beheading. Did they mention those stories?
See Syria Feature: The 6,786 Detainees Who Died in Regime Prisons
Assad maintained that any evidence of regime abuse is “politicized”: “Even the UN, it’s controlled by the United States, and the United States is against Syria.”
In contrast to his public show of concern this spring and summer, amid rebel advances that threatened the collapse of the Syrian military, Assad was relaxed at times in the conversation. He even joked when the interviewer suggested that Western countries might now be accepting his stay in power: “I thank them for saying that. I was packing my luggage to leave.”
