{"id":2161,"date":"2018-10-11T02:43:08","date_gmt":"2018-10-11T02:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/?p=2161"},"modified":"2018-10-11T02:43:08","modified_gmt":"2018-10-11T02:43:08","slug":"syrias-assad-offers-amnesty-to-army-deserters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/2018\/10\/11\/syrias-assad-offers-amnesty-to-army-deserters\/","title":{"rendered":"Syria’s Assad offers amnesty to army deserters"},"content":{"rendered":"

Syrian President\u00a0Bashar al-Assad<\/a>\u00a0has granted a general amnesty for men who deserted the army or have avoided military service.<\/p>\n

A\u00a0decree<\/a>\u00a0published by state media on Tuesday said the amnesty applies to men “inside and outside the country” and covers all punishments for desertion.<\/p>\n

Men inside\u00a0Syria<\/a>\u00a0will have four months to take advantage of the amnesty while those outside will have six months.<\/p>\n

The move could help boost the return of\u00a0refugees<\/a>, some of whom have not been able to go back home because they were blacklisted.<\/p>\n

Under Syrian military law, deserters can face years of prison if they leave their posts and do not report for service within a set amount of time.<\/p>\n

While Tuesday’s amnesty covers desertion, it does not cover fighting against the government or joining the rebels, who are regarded by the Syrian government as “terrorists”.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

Syria’s conflict<\/a>\u00a0began in 2011 after the mass uprising against Assad’s rule met a brutal government crackdown. The violence escalated and the country descended into a civil war that has claimed up to half a million lives.<\/p>\n

Many soldiers deserted, some to join the rebels and others to escape the fighting. More than half the prewar population fled their homes.<\/p>\n

About five million went abroad and millions of others were displaced internally, creating one of the worst\u00a0refugee crises<\/a>\u00a0of the modern times.<\/p>\n

The decree comes at a time when government forces have managed to capture wide areas once held by rebel fighters, including in southern Syria and the eastern suburbs of the capital, Damascus.<\/p>\n

The flashpoint in Syria is now the country’s northwestern province of Idlib, the last remaining stronghold of rebels.<\/p>\n

Lebanon<\/a>\u00a0says 50,000 Syrian refugees, among the more than a million it says are on its soil, have gone home voluntarily in assisted returns this year.<\/p>\n

However, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR<\/a>) says conditions have not yet been fulfilled for mass refugee returns.<\/p>\n

Speaking in Beirut in August, UNHCR chief Filippo Grandi said refugees were concerned about conscription, as well as other issues such as the lack of infrastructure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Syrian President\u00a0Bashar al-Assad\u00a0has granted a general amnesty for men who deserted the army or have avoided military service.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":118,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2161","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/118"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2161"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2161\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2162,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2161\/revisions\/2162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}