Dutch officials on Thursday urged nations to boost efforts to create a database of alleged war crimes in Syria, using evidence smuggled abroad by refugees and investigators. "We already have millions of pages and gigabytes of evidence," Dutch Foreign Minister Bert Koenders told a conference gathering more than 150 experts, diplomats, rights activists and international lawyers.
"And millions more are waiting - hidden in suitcases and banana crates, buried in caves and pits," he said, voicing the hope that "we can use that evidence to build airtight cases against those guilty of the worst crimes imaginable." The UN General Assembly agreed in December to set up an investigative mechanism to gather evidence on war crimes in Syria, where the civil war between President Bashar al-Assad's regime and rebels fighting to oust him has raged for six years.
It would be the first step towards trying to prosecute those responsible for atrocities in the war which has left more than 310,000 dead and forced millions to flee as refugees. The Netherlands, which already hosts top international courts dealing with the world's worst crimes, has offered expertise and a million euros to help get the database up and running. "After six years of conflict in Syria, the evidence of war crimes, human rights violations and crimes against humanity is overwhelming," Koenders said before the experts met behind closed doors.
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