Assad must be prosecuted
GIVEN the unutterable horror of the details emerging about the torture and murder of 13-year-old Syrian boy Hamza al-Khateeb, Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd's call to initiate International Criminal Court action against President Bashar al-Assad is timely and appropriate. To his credit, the Coalition's Treasury spokesman, Joe Hockey, in expressing outrage over the boy's killing by Damascus security forces, has suggested Australia should refuse to accredit a new Syrian ambassador to Canberra, leaving Assad in no doubt about the depth and bipartisan nature of the revulsion here, as elsewhere, towards gross human rights abuses in Syria.
ASSAD'S answer to the clamour for a new democracy has been to send in troops, tanks and air power. About 1100 people have been killed and 10,000 scooped up by security forces, led by the barbaric mukhabarat secret police. Tanks and helicopter gunships routinely pursue unarmed civilians.
Hamza al-Khateeb's fate is a searing reflection of the brutality. He was arrested in Saida, near Deraa, a hub of anti-government protests, on April 29. His corpse, returned to his parents last week, bore the scars of brutal torture: lacerations, bruises, burns to the feet, elbows, face and knees. All were consistent with electric shocks and whipping. Both arms had identical bullet wounds, his neck was broken and his penis severed. His father was subsequently arrested by the mukhabarat and warned to say that his son was killed by extremist rebels.
Hamza has become the Arab Spring's latest icon, compared to the Tunisian market vendor Mohammed Bouazizi and the Iranian pro-democracy activist Neda Agha Soltan whose deaths inspired potent anti-government campaigns. Hamza is among 26 children killed so far in the Syrian uprising. Murshed Aba Zaid, 18, was shot in the face by security forces outside his home and underwent successful surgery. The secret police then broke into the hospital. His body was returned to his parents with a broken neck and signs of torture.
Assad's regime is unwilling to learn the lessons of the Arab Spring in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere and is trying to outdo Muammar Gaddafi. The International Criminal Court has already issued arrest warrants for Gaddafi & Co. Mr Rudd is right to demand similar action on Assad and his thugs. Hamzah al-Khateeb's terrible fate shows their abuses are as evil.
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