Syria/France – Ochlik/Bouvier/Colvin case – French courts issue seven arrest warrants for senior Syrian officials over the bombing of the Homs press center in 2012

• On February 22, 2012, journalists Rémi Ochlik, Édith Bouvier, and Marie Colvin, photographer Paul Conroy, and interpreter Waël al-Omar were victims of a bombing while they were in an informal press center in the Syrian city of Homs. Rémi Ochlik and Marie Colvin were killed in the bombing.
• After 13 years of investigation, the investigating judges of the French War Crimes Unit issued arrest warrants for seven former senior Syrian officials for complicity in war crimes and crimes against humanity.
• The issuance of these arrest warrants paves the way for a trial in France on these charges.

Paris – September 1, 2025. Investigating judges of the French War Crimes Unit have issued arrest warrants for seven former senior Syrian officials, including fallen President Bashar al-Assad. They are accused of complicity in war crimes and crimes against humanity committed against French and international journalists Rémi Ochlik, Édith Bouvier, Marie Colvin, and Paul Conroy, and interpreter Wael al-Omar, who were killed and wounded in the attack on the informal press center in Homs, Syria, on February 22, 2012.

These arrest warrants target Bashar al-Assad (former Syrian head of state), Ali Ayoub (former Chief of Staff of the Syrian army), Ali Mamlouk (former head of Syrian General Intelligence), Ghassan Bilal (former head of the Security Office of the Syrian Army’s 4th Division), Maher al-Assad (former Major General and de facto commander of the Syrian Army’s 4th Division), Mohamed Dib Zaitoun (former head of the General Security Directorate), Rafik Mahmoud Shahadah (former head of security for the Military and Security Committee in Homs).

“The issuance of these 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 against Rémi Ochlik and his fellow journalists who were in the informal press center in Bab Amr in February 2012 ,” explains Clémence Bectarte, lawyer for the FIDH, SCM, and Rémi Ochlik’s parents Martine Plas and François Locatelli.

French journalists Rémi Ochlik and Édith Bouvier, along with American journalist Marie Colvin and British photographer Paul Conroy, had clandestinely entered the besieged city of Homs to document the crimes committed by Bashar al-Assad’s regime. They were victims of a targeted bombing by the Syrian regime while they were in an informal press center in the Bab Amr neighborhood, accompanied by Syrian interpreter Wael al-Omar, on February 22, 2012. Rémi Ochlik and Marie Colvin were killed in the attack, while Edith Bouvier, Paul Conroy, and Wael al-Omar were wounded but managed to escape. This attack marked a turning point in the documentation, by foreign journalists, of the crimes committed in Syria by the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

“The judicial investigation clearly established that the attack on the informal press center in Bab Amr was part of the Syrian regime’s explicit intention to target foreign journalists in order to limit media coverage of its crimes and force them to leave the city and the country,” said Mazen Darwish, lawyer and Director General of the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression (SCM). “The fight for justice on behalf of the victims of Bashar al-Assad’s regime continues, and we hope that a satisfactory transitional justice process can quickly be established in Syria.”

SCM contributed to the case as a civil party, by submitting evidence and bringing witnesses.

To date, French authorities have issued 21 arrest warrants for senior Syrian officials, including three for former head of state Bashar al-Assad.