By Peter Omopo
September 2, 2025
French judicial authorities have issued international arrest warrants for ousted Syrian president Bashar al-Assad and six senior members of his former regime over the 2012 bombardment of Homs, which killed two foreign journalists.
Marie Colvin, a 56-year-old American correspondent for The Sunday Times of Britain, and French photographer Rémi Ochlik, 28, died on February 22, 2012, when artillery fire struck an informal media centre in the rebel-held city. French prosecutors are treating the incident as both a potential war crime and a crime against humanity.
British photographer Paul Conroy, French reporter Edith Bouvier, and Syrian translator Wael Omar were injured in the attack.
Assad, who fled to Russia with his family after being toppled by Islamist rebels in late 2024, has not been seen publicly since.
In addition to Assad, the warrants target his brother Maher al-Assad — commander of the elite 4th Armoured Division at the time — former intelligence chief Ali Mamlouk, and then-army chief of staff Ali Ayoub.
“The issuing of the seven arrest warrants is a decisive step that paves the way for a trial in France for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by Bashar al-Assad’s regime,” said Clémence Bectarte, lawyer for the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and Ochlik’s family.
The FIDH stated that Colvin and Ochlik had entered Homs clandestinely to document atrocities and were killed in a “targeted bombing.” Investigators concluded the strike was part of an intentional campaign by the Syrian regime to eliminate foreign journalists and suppress coverage of its actions.
Mazen Darwish, lawyer and director of the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression, added: “The investigation clearly established that the attack was aimed at silencing the press and deterring journalists from reporting on the conflict.”
Colvin, known worldwide for her fearless frontline reporting and trademark black eye patch — a result of a previous injury in Sri Lanka’s civil war — was later immortalised in the Golden Globe-nominated film A Private War.
