Majdi Nema

Before the investigating chamber of the Paris Court of Appeal on February 7, his lawyers had also questioned the principle of universal jurisdiction of French justice in his case. According to Rémy Heitz, the investigating chamber rejected the argument that the condition of “double incrimination” provided for in the law of August 9, 2010 was not met. According to this principle, crimes against humanity and war crimes must be recognized in the country of origin of a suspect whom France intends to prosecute. However, Syria, like other countries, does not recognize these crimes and has not ratified the Rome Statute, which created the International Criminal Court.

In its decision, the investigating chamber notes that Syrian law punishes, as in France, “the recruitment and participation of minors in hostilities,” explains the public prosecutor. In addition, “a number of other war crimes and offenses as defined in the French Penal Code are provided for by equivalence in Syrian legislation, and are in accordance with the declared desire of this country to fight against these offenses,” he adds.

“How France issued a visa to a jihadist accused of war crimes,” translated from “Comment la France a délivré un visa à un djihadiste accusé de crimes de guerre,” Le Figaro, February 6, 2020:

Majdi Mustafa Nema, alias Islam Allouche, was indicted in France at the end of January. The Syrian was registered in a French research institute with the Erasmus+ program and had a valid visa.

Former senior official of a Syrian Salafist group, he was indicted in France and then imprisoned at the end of January. One question remains: how did Majdi Mustafa Nema, alias Islam Allouche, obtain a visa for France? What enabled a man, since accused by French justice of “acts of torture and complicity”, “war crimes” and “complicity in enforced disappearances”, to enroll in a research institute? French with the Erasmus+ program and a valid visa? Update on a case full of gray areas.

Who is Madji Mustafa Nema?

Born in 1988, captain of the Syrian Armed Forces from which he defected, he became spokesperson for the Islamist group Jaich al-Islam (Army of Islam). He announced in June 2017 that he was resigning and taking back his real name. After his indictment in France, the group demanded his release last Saturday, claiming to have severed all ties with him. Jaich al-Islam was one of the most important opposition groups to Bashar al-Assad’s regime in the Damascus region, especially Eastern Ghouta, after the start of the war in 2011. He participated in the Geneva talks started in 2015, which ended in failure. “This group controlled the checkpoints through which humanitarian aid for Ghouta passed and collected its taxes on the way,” Fabrice Balanche, a geographer specializing in Syria at the University of Lyon 2, told AFP.

The Syrian’s Facebook account mentions that he went through the Hungarian ELTE University in Budapest in 2018 and then graduated from Istanbul Aydin University in Political Science and International Relations. His goal, “is to retrain and become an agent of influence with a university background to be more credible,” says Fabrice Balanche.

What was he doing in France?

According to a judicial source, Majdi Mustafa Nema had been in France since November 2019. He was registered as a student at the Institute for Research on the Arab and Muslim World (Iremam) of the University of Aix Marseille, which falls under the National Research Center scientist (CNRS). He had obtained from the French consulate in Istanbul a “short-stay visa issued on the basis of a complete file, after questioning the competent ministerial services,” indicated Thursday the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs. This type of Schengen visa is valid for 90 days. According to a source familiar with the matter, he was “unknown to the services of the Ministry of the Interior” and had nine different identities. Iremam said the Syrian had come under the European Erasmus+ program. Asked by AFP, Erasmus made no comment.

After the Arab Spring, “hundreds of young activists from these countries have converted the political capital acquired in their militant years into study or research projects in the social sciences”, explained to AFP Richard Jacquemond, director of the ‘Iremam, adding that he did not know about Mr. Nema’s past. When a candidate obtains a visa, “I consider that the consular services have done their job and that he is persona grata”, he added, stressing that these are often “very interesting profiles because ‘they can give us first-hand knowledge’.

But Chris Doyle, director of the Council for Arab British Understanding (Caabu) in London, notes that the Syrian had been refused entry to a major British university and is surprised at the absence in France of the usual checks. “How many people like him are trying (…) to enter the European Union and start a new life as academics, despite an opaque past about what they did at the front?” he questioned, joined by AFP.

Why was he arrested?

The former spokesperson is notably suspected of the kidnapping on December 9, 2013 of the Syrian lawyer and journalist Razan Zeitouneh, her husband Waël Hamada and two of his collaborators. None have been found since. Last June, a complaint accusing members of Jaich al-Islam of having notably committed “acts of torture” and “crimes against humanity and war crimes” in Ghouta had been filed.

The initiative was notably supported by the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), the League for Human Rights (LDH) and the Syrian Media Center (SCM). Their work made it possible to establish an organizational chart of Jaich al-Islam, explained to AFP Clémence Bectarte, lawyer for FIDH. The NGO reported on January 10 its presence in court.