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Syria Scraps al-Assad-Era 'Terrorism' Court Amid Kurdish Unrest

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Syria's parliament voted to abolish the 2012 Counter-Terrorism Court and void its rulings, as fuel-price protests grip the Kurdish northeast.

Syria's newly formed parliament voted on Wednesday to abolish a Counter-Terrorism Court created under ousted President Bashar al-Assad, and to strip legal force from the verdicts it handed down. The decision, reported by state broadcaster Al-Ekhbariya TV, ranks among the first substantial pieces of legislation passed by the country's post-al-Assad assembly.

The court, set up in 2012, had prosecuted thousands of Syrians on charges classed as terrorism-related during al-Assad's rule. Syria's current authorities had already stopped recognising the body, and Wednesday's ballot put its closure into law while cancelling the effects of its judgments.

The vote fell in the early weeks of the first legislature assembled since al-Assad's removal. The chamber held its inaugural session in July and had devoted its opening meetings to drafting internal procedures and forming committees before turning to major decisions.

Moves against the court predate the parliamentary vote. In June 2025, President Ahmed al-Sharaa signed a decree removing 67 judges who had sat on what he then called the "abolished Counter-Terrorism Court". Syria's constitutional declaration of March 2025 had likewise urged that the effects of what it termed unjust rulings be undone, including the return of seized property to those affected.

International scrutiny had long trailed the court. In 2024, the United Nations Human Rights Committee found that the 2012 law behind the tribunal did not supply essential judicial safeguards. The committee flagged worries about detention without due cause, torture and mistreatment, and doubts over whether the court acted independently.

The al-Assad family governed Syria for 53 years. That era closed on December 8, 2024, when a rapid 11-day offensive toppled the government, catching Syria and outside observers off guard. The collapse ended a security apparatus widely condemned for torture and forced disappearances, capping 14 years of conflict that began in 2011.

Fuel protests choke the M4 highway

As lawmakers acted in Damascus, unrest played out in the northeast. Hundreds of oil tanker trucks sat idle on Wednesday after protesters shut a main road near the town of Tal Tamr. The demonstrators had blocked the route in anger at climbing fuel prices, halting shipments moving out of the Qamishli and Rmeilan oilfields.

The price increases trace back to a change in control. While the Syrian Democratic Forces held northeastern Syria, including its oil installations, fuel was sold at heavily subsidised rates. Once the central government took over the region, it scrapped those subsidies, and costs climbed for residents who had grown used to cheaper fuel.

Strain over the SDF merger

Frustration in the Kurdish areas has grown alongside a drive to fold the SDF, once a leading Kurdish-led fighting force, into Syria's national army and place it under central command. An integration deal reached in August was broadly read as a win for al-Sharaa's administration.

Still, the accord has not settled matters on the ground. The current friction is measuring the president's capacity to hold together a country worn down by years of war. Before the conflict, Kurds accounted for roughly 10 percent of Syria's population of 23 million and had faced marginalisation under the al-Assad dynasty. During the fighting, they established a self-run zone across the northeast, an arrangement now being unwound as Damascus extends its authority.

Syria Counter-Terrorism Court, Ahmed al-Sharaa, Syrian Democratic Forces, Syria parliament, Kurdish protests Syria, Bashar al-Assad, Tal Tamr fuel protest, SDF integration

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