Syria’s interior minister revealed on Wednesday that authorities have detained a former general from the Assad regime who is accused of direct involvement in the deadly 2013 chemical weapons attack on Eastern Ghouta, AFP reported.
In a post on social media, Interior Minister Anas Khattab stated that “Adnan Abboud Hilweh, one of the most prominent officers responsible for the chemical massacre in Eastern Ghouta in 2013, is now in the custody of the Counter-Terrorism Department."
According to US intelligence assessments, more than 1,000 civilians were killed by sarin nerve gas in the Damascus suburb during the Syrian civil war in 2013. The attack was widely attributed to forces loyal to then-president Bashar Assad, who was ousted from power in late 2024.
The Assad regime regularly denied having any connection to chemical weapons attacks in Syria and rejected investigations by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) into its chemical attacks as “fabricated".
Hilweh was one of three Syrian generals identified by the US State Department in 2022 as being involved in “gross violations of human rights, namely the flagrant denial of the right to life of at least 1,400 people in Ghouta." The designation banned Hilweh and his immediate family members from entering the United States.
He was also subjected to sanctions by the European Union, the United Kingdom, and several other countries, noted the AFP report.
Syria’s Foreign Minister Asaad Hassan al-Shibani declared in March of last year that the country is committed to eliminating any remaining chemical weapons following the fall of Assad's government.
Syria’s 13-year civil war resulted in the deaths of more than half a million people and displaced millions more. Tens of thousands of Syrians disappeared, many of them vanishing into the regime’s notorious prison system.
The new Syrian authorities have repeatedly pledged to deliver justice and accountability for crimes committed under the Assad regime. Activists and the international community have stressed the critical need for effective transitional justice mechanisms in the war-torn country.
On Monday, a Syrian court held the first hearing in the trial of Assad, who is being tried in absentia, along with several senior figures from his former government. One defendant, former security official Atif Najib, a relative of Assad, appeared in person in the dock wearing handcuffs.
Assad fled to Moscow in December 2024 with only a small group of close associates as Islamist-led forces advanced on Damascus. He left behind many senior officials and security officers, some of whom reportedly fled abroad or sought safety in the coastal regions traditionally inhabited by Assad’s Alawite minority.