Arabic version: الحكم بالإعدام على وسيم الأسد في سوريا

According to Al Jazeera, Syria’s Fourth Criminal Court in Damascus sentenced former regime figure Wassim al-Assad to death after finding him guilty of premeditated murder, torture and other crimes connected to the country’s 14-year war.

Wassim al-Assad, 46, is a cousin of former President Bashar al-Assad and was born in Latakia on Syria’s Mediterranean coast. He was charged with establishing and leading pro-regime paramilitary groups from early 2011, when protests linked to the Arab Spring were violently suppressed and civil war began.

The court found that an armed group linked to Wassim al-Assad had abducted and killed Syrians. Judge Fakhr al-Din al-Aryan said he had committed multiple murders and murder accompanied by torture and brutality, classified as crimes against humanity and war crimes. He was also charged over military operations targeting civilian areas in Eastern Ghouta, including al-Mleiha, and the court ordered his assets confiscated.

Arrested in June 2025 after returning from Lebanon, Wassim al-Assad had long faced accusations of overseeing Captagon production and smuggling under the former regime. The court found him not guilty of drug-trafficking charges, citing insufficient evidence of his direct involvement. He is under United States and European sanctions.

The ruling came one week after Bashar al-Assad, his brother Maher al-Assad and cousin Atef Najib were also sentenced to death. Bashar and Maher were sentenced in absentia after fleeing to Moscow following the fall of the al-Assad regime in December 2024. The trials have been viewed as a test of Syria’s transitional justice system under President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s government.