Two senior white house officials met on Thursday with former Syrian military police photographer “Caesar,” who defected from the Bashar al- Assad regime with thousands of photographs of brutalized bodies, suggestive of torture and killing on an industrial scale by the Assad regime.
A statement by Deputy National Security Advisor Benjamin Rhodes and National Security Advisor to the Vice President Jake Sullivan said the images that “Caesar” has shared with the world paint a picture of unimaginable suffering – gouged eyes, abrasions in the silhouette of metal chains, and the emaciated corpses of men, women, and children – and offer some of the most heart wrenching evidence of the unconscionable tactics Bashar al-Assad employs to cling to power.
“The United States remains deeply disturbed that because Russia and China vetoed a referral to the International Criminal Court (ICC) that was supported by every other member of the United Nations Security Council, the perpetrators cannot be held to account in the ICC. Nevertheless, the United States will continue working through other avenues with our international partners to pursue accountability for the perpetrators of these crimes against the Syrian people,” the statement said.
The Syrian defector known as “Caesar” told Congress on Thursday that the regime of Syrian Bashar al Assad is holding 150,000 civilians in custody, all of whom are at risk of being tortured or killed by the state.
Congress was shocked when he recounted how he documented Assad’s killing of over 11,000 innocents.
At the hearing, Caesar displayed new photos from his collection of 55,000 images showing the torture, starvation, and death of over 11,000 civilians.
Caesar smuggled the pictures out of Syria when he fled last year in fear for his life.