‘Sports washing’ has been one of the tactics used by the Assad regime in an attempt to improve its image and normalize relations with the rest of the world and the Summer Olympics in Paris provided it with the largest stage so far. But even though six Syrian athletes were able to attend as representatives of Syria, things did not go as well as the regime may have hoped they would.
It began at the end of August 2023, when the chairperson of the Syrian Paralympic Committee, Omar al-Aroub, posted a photo of himself in front of the Eiffel Tower. It was good for him to use the Olympic preparation trip for a photo op as he did not receive the accreditation necessary to participate in this year’s Olympic Games.
The Syria Campaign launched a petition under the hashtag #TorchForJustice successfully drawing attention to the case and preventing al-Aroub’s participation in the Olympic Games
But it was also good for the Syrians who recognized him from the photo and had previously seen him in a different capacity: To this day, al-Aroub operates as the deputy leader of the Baath Brigades in Aleppo, a militia that has committed human rights crimes in Syria and played a key role in the offensive on eastern Aleppo in particular. The Baath Brigades are also closely linked to the National Union of Syrian Students (NUSS), in which al-Aroub also holds a high-ranking office. According to witnesses, in this role, al-Aroub personally ordered opposition students to be thrown out of windows on the fourth floor of student residences.
After being informed of al-Aroub’s intention to participate in the 2024 Olympics in France, The Syria Campaign launched a petition under the hashtag #TorchForJustice successfully drawing attention to the case and preventing al-Aroub’s participation in the Olympic Games. Not long before the games were set to begin, Ranim Ahmed, Communications Director of The Syria Campaign announced that they were told by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) that al-Aroub “is not on the list of accredited people for the Olympics and Paralympic Games Paris 2024.”
The announcement evoked a sigh of relief for many Syrians, especially since as recently as September 2023 French authorities claimed not to know anything about al-Aroub’s past in this regard. A glance at the official website of the Syrian Olympic Committee, where these two positions are prominently listed, would have sufficed. Particularly the NUSS’s role was detailed in a report by the Syrian-British Consortium titled “Militias on Campus: Crimes of the National Union of Syrian Students at Damascus University”, released in July 2024.
the Assad regime resorted to all forces, formed militias, or armed and militarized existing organizations, as in the case of the NUSS, to nip the protests in the bud.
The NUSS, founded in 1963, is one of the instruments used by the Assad regime to mobilize and exert control in the past. Since the beginning of the Syrian revolution in early 2011 at the latest, they have had a free hand to intimidate and abuse fellow students.
When the protests against the regime spread across the country in 2011, it quickly became clear that the Syrian army and security services were unable to bring the uprising under control. As a result, the Assad regime resorted to all forces, formed militias, or armed and militarized existing organizations, as in the case of the NUSS, to nip the protests in the bud.
The NUSS was particularly important for the regime in Aleppo. In Syria’s largest city, there were fewer protests overall than in Homs or Hama, for example, where hundreds of thousands took to the streets and tied down the conventional troops. At Aleppo University, however, where students from all over the country came together, things were boiling. Academic Ali Aljasem writes about this in the Journal of Perpetrator Research that this “explains the Assad regime’s reliance on opaque networks to thwart the protests, rather than using regular forces as in other cities.” A report published in 2023 by the Syrian Centre for Media Freedom (SCMF) traces the actions of the NUSS in Aleppo in more detail.
Those who got off lightly lost their place in a hall of residence or were forcibly exmatriculated. However, many had experiences that were far more drastic: From 2011 to 2013 alone, the Syrian Network for Human Rights estimates that around 35,000 students were arrested across the country, including 4,000 Women. The NUSS intimidated protesters, arrested them, called in thugs – the so-called shabiha – and handed students over to the regime’s notorious secret services.
Omar al-Aroub, himself active in Aleppo and a member of the Executive Council of the nationwide association, had received his mandate from the NUSS leadership in Damascus. In the capital too, the regime relied entirely on the student association to suppress the protests.
From the Faculty of Fine Arts to the Faculty of Dentistry, the NUSS tortured students in 13 rooms at the University of Damascus alone. Ayham Ghazzouz, a dentistry student, became tragically famous when he died shortly after being severely beaten with iron bars by members of the NUSS in one of the regime’s interrogation centers.
The Syrian British Consortium’s release of its report on the systematic human rights abuses of NUSS was widely perceived as an accurate representation of the perversity of the organization. Since the report’s release, dozens more survivors have contacted the Syrian British Consortium to record their testimonies.
NUSS members enjoyed numerous benefits that promoted their academic careers; they were also allowed to carry weapons on campus. In 2016, Omar al-Aroub was rewarded with a seat as a member of parliament.
“It’s thanks to the bravery of survivors of regime crimes and the strong support from the public that a war criminal has been prevented from attending. It’s beyond shocking that he was ever allowed to represent the Syrian team, visiting Paris as part of preparations, in the first place,” said Ranim Ahmed. “The IOC should now refuse to recognize Aroub as the chairman of the Syrian Paralympic Committee and Syria’s vice president of the General Sports Federation. Ultimately, he and all regime officials involved in the killing, arrest, and torture of Syrian students must be brought to justice in a court of law.”
The regime sees no reason to make any substantial changes, let alone to come to terms with the past. NUSS members enjoyed numerous benefits that promoted their academic careers; they were also allowed to carry weapons on campus. In 2016, Omar al-Aroub was rewarded with a seat as a member of parliament.
Any reshuffles merely served to polish up the image. In 2020, Dareen Suleiman, who had been largely unknown until then, succeeded Ammar Saati, the chairman of the Union and subject to US sanctions. At the time, he had already been chairman of the NUSS for 17 years and was therefore well past student age. The opposition Syrian newspaper Enab Baladi described Suleiman as the regime’s ‘silk glove’, which was intended to make the NUSS respectable again. Emphasizing that she represents all students in Syria, Suleiman said when she took office and described the human rights crimes committed by NUSS members as the “mistakes of individuals.” The brutal crackdown on students did not change. Nevertheless, UNDP cooperated with the NUSS on the occasion of the Hult Prize in 2021. In 2022, Suleiman represented the student association at an international education conference in New York.
Bashar Assad has been using events like COP and the Olympics to whitewash his regime’s crimes. Organizers of international events and governments should do more to bar the regime from these occasions, or at the very least, thoroughly investigate whom the regime is sending.
With the growing calls among European states to resume relations with the Syrian regime, in the future, it will become increasingly important to understand the role that internal Syrian organizations have played in human rights crimes and crimes against humanity. Whether in healthcare, education, or sports, it will be difficult to find official institutions in Syria that were not involved in, or even benefited from, the brutal repression. Already in the past, Bashar Assad has been using events like COP and the Olympics to whitewash his regime’s crimes. Organizers of international events and governments should do more to bar the regime from these occasions, or at the very least, thoroughly investigate whom the regime is sending.
As for the six Syrian athletes who were able to participate in this year’s Olympics, four of them failed to advance beyond the first round in their fields, the controversial equestrian mentioned in a previous article withdrew, and the sixth took fifth place in a weightlifting event held on the last day. In the end, their most significant achievement may have been acquiring the realization of just how much the Assad regime has stifled the talent and opportunities to excel for their fellow Syrians in their homeland.
