Syrians in London mark anniversary of Assad chemical attack in Ghouta. Demotix/Peter Marshall. All rights reserved.Diplomatic efforts at the international summit in Vienna focused on ISIS, the position of the US and Russia on bringing Iran and Saudi Arabia to the negotiating table, and whether Assad was going to be part of the future government or not. However, mainstream media failed to report what had been said about the future of Syrian state institutions; namely, in a statement released by the European External Action Service, that they would remain intact.
It was precisely the task of the Syrian revolution to destroy existing Baathist state institutions and rebuild democratic ones. Since Russia and China vetoed the UN Security Council resolution to refer the situation in Syria to the International Criminal Court, there are no known intentions of persecuting police and security force personnel for their crimes, and no mechanisms for investigations into abuse have been developed.
Members of the UN Security Council have not issued a resolution that prohibits the targeting of civilians in Syria. Massacres are still being committed and the west is not taking any steps to stop the ongoing violations. State institutions have been responsible for the death of more than 250,000 people (115,627 of them civilians, including 12,517 children and 8,062 females over the age of 18) since 2011.
