‘Syrian refugees returning home suffer repression’

By Ayhan Simsek

BERLIN

Germany heavily criticized the Syrian regime on Friday over reports of torture, harassment and repression of Syrian refugees returning home.

Speaking at a news conference in the capital Berlin, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas reaffirmed Berlin’s support for UN efforts to find a political solution in Syria, but voiced scepticism over the regime’s intentions.

“What we have been witnessing in Syria in these days is that people who want to return from Jordan to Syria, they suffer repression, some of them are thrown into prison,” he said.

The Syrian regime’s repressive measures and continued arrests has been a source of tension ahead of a planned meeting of Syrian constitutional committee, deepening the opposition groups’ distrust of Damascus’s intentions.

Maas underlined that Germany, together with its EU partners, would continue supporting UN efforts for convening the Syrian constitutional committee.

“What we want to achieve now is first of all an agreement on the composition of a constitutional committee,” he said, and underlined that this process should initiate constitutional reforms and lead to democratic elections in Syria.