In March of 2011, the first demonstrations against the regime of Bashar Al-Assad

emerged in Syria, who is still the president of Syria and inherited the power of his
father, Hafez Al-Assad, when he died in June 2000.

Hafez Al-Assad who in turn had come to power in 1970 with a coup taking the
leadership of the Baath party (Arab Socialist Party) and harshly eliminating all
political rivals, putting in positions of responsibility to close relatives and people of
your entire confidence.

President Hafez Al-Assad did not allow any kind of political opposition during his
regime. That caused that in the 70s, the population of people led by Muslim
brothers who wanted to overthrow the regime and establish an Islamic State, which
ended in an annihilation known as the hama massacre 1 in February 1982,
increased between 20,0002 and 30,0003 people. they were mostly civilians.

Since Hafez Al-assad's coup d'état, the Baath party and the security forces
remained in the Al-Assad family and its trusted people, all belonging to the Alu
minority which is a branch of Islam that corresponds to 12% of the total population
in a mostly Sunni country.

With the death Hafez Al-assad, his son Bashar Al-assad succeeds all the charges
of his father, when this begins his term promises political and economic reforms
"the damask spring", but the few reforms that were made were revoked A short
time later, the Syrian model of the autocratic model of years ago that had promised
to change.

The current armed conflict in Syria begins on March 6 of 2011, that day a group of
teenagers was arrested in Dara, in the south of the country, for drawing on a wall a
graffiti against the regime at that time, this arrest unleashed large demonstrations
in the city that were repressed by the police bodies which opened fire on the
civilian population in such a way that the annoying population spread the protests
throughout the country in a matter of months.

The strong repression against the protests generates an organized movement,

together with an armed civil and military opposition conformed by deserters of the
bodies and security forces of the regime, alerted by the excessive use of force
against the population. The first armed rebellion accident occurred in June 2011,
near the border with Turkey, when a group of local civilians took the arms of a
police station after shooting at the demonstrators of the regime forces; Much of the

1 https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-internacional-43791849
2 “A guide to the syrian conflict: ten key words” CIDOB, p.1,
https://www.cidob.org , pp.1-9 dossiers.
3 Riestra laura: “eight points to understand the conflict in sirya ” , in

http://www.abc.es/20120610/internacional/abci-siria-evolucion-conflicto-
201206061519.html

1
unit of the army sent to the area joins the armed civilians in their fight against the
regime, in a short time the conflict spreads throughout the country with an
opposition full of arms and ammunition.

In June 2012, the International Committee of the Red Cross describes the situation
in Syria as an internal armed conflict that branches off on an internal level.

One conclusion may be that in Syria there is an internal armed conflict (civil war)
that has gradually become internationalized since the other countries have
supported the parties to the conflict, this conflict for the actors involved, the strong
violations of the law international humanitarian law and the use of chemical
weapons constitutes a threat to international peace and security

2. response of the international community

When the first alerts and denunciations appeared, an investigation mission of the
United Nations high commissioner of human rights was agreed upon to determine
the violations that were committed within the conflict in Syria 4, on the other hand
the human rights council of the United Nations (UN) organization asked the
government of Syria to end the acts of violence5, however the monitoring reports of
compliance with this petition showed that the crimes against humanity and the war
crimes committed by the government and the opposition had not decreased, on the
contrary they continued to increase6.

The responses given by the international community have been very limited7, some
regional organizations that were active during the crisis in Libya (March-October
2011) are skeptical that there is no decision that includes measures coercive
enough to mitigate what is happening. effects of war on the civilian population.

In the meeting held by the council on April 27, 2011 to prepare the first assessment
of the situation 8 , a clear division was found among its members as the British
representative pressed to act while the Russian claimed that it was a internal
conflict and how the two parties to the conflict had used violence could not be
considered a threat to international peace and security. On April 29, 2011, the
human rights council approved resolution S-16/1 expressly condemning the use of
violence against opponents of the regime.

4 Report of 18 of august of 2011

5 Resolution 19/22 of the human rights council of the, March 23 of 2012.
6 Distributed report of, September 25 of 2015 (A/HRC/21/32)
7 http://.relacionesinternacionales.info. The united nations before the conflict in sirya,

opinion documet,18/december/2012,pag. 1-15.”the responsability ti protect of the

international community in the cases of Libya y Syria: comparative analysis”, No.22 ,
may/2013, pag. 127-148.
8 S/PV.6534,27 of april, 2011

2
On May 25, 2011, Germany, the United Kingdom, France and Portugal again tried
to get the Security Council to become involved in the conflict in Syria, presenting a
draft resolution condemning the situation and in which they were clearly and
obviously the obligation of the State of Syria to protect all its citizens, on the
contrary China, South Africa, India, Brazil and Russia argued that the resolution
should not determine the nature of the reform program of the Syrian government
because it was an internal matter in the which could not interfere by virtue of
sovereignty.

The states in favor of adopting a resolution to resolve the conflict of substance

resumed later in October 2011, again presenting a draft requesting the end of
violence and the incorporation of reforms, as well as the option of adding sanctions
in the case that the State of Syria did not fulfill its obligation of protection9, like the
previous proposals this was rejected with two votes against China and Russia10,
together with four abstentions from the states of South Africa, India, Lebanon and
Brazil.

The General Assembly of the United Nations Organization adopted on February

16, 2012 resolution 66 / 253A condemning the facts 11 , on August 13, 2012 in
resolution 66 / 253B, draws attention to the Security Council by urging it to
examine measures conducive to the crisis of Syria.

The letter of peacekeeping in its Art.24 establishes that the Security Council is the
main responsible so that it must declare the situation of the country before
adopting coercive measures that end the conflict or reduce it in less burdensome
measures

According to current international law, the Security Council can apply chapter VII in
the presence of a conflict that is a threat to international peace and security if it
considers it appropriate but is not in the legal obligation to do so, so that if the If the
council had authorized an armed intervention with the aim of ending the
confrontations and protecting the population, this use of force in Syria would have
been legal in accordance with the charter of the United Nations and international
law.

9 S/PV.6627, 4 of october, 2011.

10 Russia returned to affirm that the resolution did not respect the concepts of
sovereignity, territorial integrity and non intervention (doc./PV.6627, October 4 of
2011, p.3-4)
11 Carswell, Andrew J. “Unblocking the UN Security council. The uniting fo peace

resolution”, journal of conflict & security law, 2013, pag.453-480

3
The responsibility to protect has been accepted by the international community12,
the final document of the Millennium Summit13.

"The responsibility to protect provides a political framework based on fundamental

principles of international law to prevent and respond to genocide, war crimes,
ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. It is clear that the convention has
been widely accepted. The main organs of the united nations have invoked the
concept among them the security council and general assembly " 14

This concept accepted in the final document includes three elements that are worth
highlighting: the duty to react (with coercive measures that can reach an armed
intervention), the duty to prevent and the duty to rebuild.

The duty to react in the event of armed interventions as in Syria, depends on a

conditioning element that is a prior authorization of the security council. This
implies, that the veto is not interposed by the abstention of one of the five
permanent members of the advice . On the other hand, international practice
indicates that the responsibility to protect is materialized through armed and non-
armed coercive measures.

The duty to prevent is the first to emerge from the concept of the responsibility to
protect, the idea of prevention in conflicts and humanitarian crises is not something
recent or of little importance, this responsibility has generated awareness of its
importance and need at the same time serve to create an adequate environment
that defends the community.

Conclusions

The humanitarian catastrophe in Syria fulfills the requirements for the effective
realization of the responsibility to protect, in addition to being a threat to
international security and peace.

The conflict in Syria (2011-2014) constitutes a threat to international peace and

security. In this, cruelties susceptible of allowing the invoking of the concept of the
responsibility to protect have been committed. The Security Council has not
prevented the humanitarian crisis that the Syrian State is experiencing. The veto of
the permanent members of the council has prevented it.

12 “Peace operations of the united nations chapter.VII,exception or extended

practice?”.No.2/2013,pag 1-28
13 Final document of the world summit 2005, october 24 of 2005, paragraph

138-139
14 The responsibility to protect: timely and decisive response. Report of the Secretary

General, July 25, 2012, page 18-19

4
The Security Council had to stop the conflict to protect the civilian population from
the constant attacks of the regime, which it did not since the vote against China
and Russia have prevented it to the point that the Secretary General of the United
Nations has declared it in its 2013 report on the application of the responsibility to
protect, recognizing the damage caused by this institutional insensitivity to the
population:

"Our collective inaction to prevent the atrocious crimes in the Syrian Arab Republic
during the last two and a half years will continue to be a heavy moral burden for the
prestige of the united nations and their members, particularly those who have the
primary responsibility for peace and international security "15

The concept of the responsibility to protect needs, in order to be able to practice

the modification of the parameters that govern the right of veto of the permanent
members of the security council. It must be understood that the authorization of the
security council is sufficient for the international community to react with the
necessary measures, including armed intervention to help mitigate the effects on
the civilian population of the country, because they can not continue committing
abuses against the civil population of Syria and that the international community
remains motionless under the argument that national sovereignty is the supreme
principle of international law, thus ignoring and transgressing other fundamental
rights of the human being since it would be "depriving international law of all its
essential value "16

15 "The responsibility to protect: responsibility of the state and prevention. Report of

the Secretary General "(A / 67/929-S / 2013/399) (July 9, 2013), page1-17
16 Tomuschat Christian“international law : ensuring the survival of mankind on the

eve of a new century. General course on public inernational law” 1999, pag 224.