Syria bars civil society activists from travel
Syria, Politics, 7/12/2006

Syrian authorities have amplified their
crackdown against civil society activists, arbitrarily restricting several
of them from leaving the country, Human Rights Watch said today.

Those most recently denied the right to leave Syria include: Radwan
Ziadeh, director of the Damascus Centre for Human Rights Studies; Suheir
Atassi, head of the Jamal al-Atassi Forum for Democratic Dialogue, which
Syrian authorities shut down last year; Walid al-Bunni, a physician who
helped found the Committees for the Revival of Civil Society; and Samar
al-Labwani, the wife of jailed human rights activist Kamal al-Labwani.

"These travel bans are a crude attempt to prevent Syrian civil society
activists from interacting with the outside world," said Joe Stork, deputy
director of the Middle East and North Africa division at Human Rights Watch.
"Shy of putting these activists in jail, the Syrian government is instead
putting them under a type of national house arrest."

Ziadeh was traveling from Damascus to Amman on June 26 when Syrian security
forces at the border prevented him from leaving the country. They did not
explain the reason for the travel ban but indicated that the General
Intelligence Agency (al-Mukhabarat al-`Ama) had issued the order and that
Ziadeh had to report to them. He was on his way to participate in an
international conference on human rights and criminal justice organized by
the Amman Centre for Human Rights Studies.

Following the ban imposed on Ziadeh, three other civil society activists
learned that the government also had issued orders banning them from
traveling. Suheir Atassi was scheduled to leave Syria on July 2 for a 10-day
visit to France after receiving a scholarship from the French government for
her activities as a youth leader. The immigration authorities informed her
that the Palestine Branch of Military Intelligence had issued the order
restricting her travel. The Palestine Branch houses a prison that the
government uses to jail a number of political activists.

The government had released Walid al-Bunni from jail in January 2006 after
he served five years for his involvement in the "Damascus Spring" movement
in 2001. The Damascus Spring was a period of intense political and social
debate in Syria, which started after the death of President Hafez al-Asad in
June 2000 and continued until the government suppressed these activities in
the fall of 2001. For the first time since 1989, al-Bunni was able to obtain
a passport, and was hoping to travel to Saudi Arabia to visit relatives and
to Greece to attend a conference. He learned that it was the General
Intelligence Agency (al-Mukhabarat al-`Ama) that had issued the order
banning him from travel.

Immigration authorities informed Samar Labwani at the Lebanese border that
the General Intelligence Agency (al-Mukhabarat al-`Ama) had issued orders
banning her from traveling. They did not inform her of the reasons for the
ban. Syrian security agents have detained her husband, the activist
Kamal al-Labwani, since November 8, 2005. Labwani has been charged,
amongst other things, with contacting a foreign state with the intent of
initiating aggression against Syria. His trial resumes on July 16.

Under international law, everyone is free to leave his or her country. The
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Syria is a
state party, bars states from restricting someone's right to leave the
country, except when the given restrictions are prescribed by law and are
"necessary to protect national security, public order, public health or
morals or the rights and freedoms of others," and are consistent with the
other rights recognized in that treaty. Syrian security agents have issued
travel bans in Syria without any explanation and without any judicial basis.

Previous Stories:
  Syrian online journalist to serve six months in prison   (6/10/2006)
  Many Syrian activists had been arrested   (5/23/2006)
  Khaddam promotes collapse of the Syrian regime   (5/2/2006)

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