Rebuilding Security in New Syria: Week 23

Tracking the spread of new security forces and security incidents in post-Assad Syria from May 12 to May 18

Announcements of security deployments mostly in western Syria, with an emphasis on the minority regions. Content is categorized as deployment, crime, statement, arrest, operation. This weekly update is intended to provide base level data for more holistic research into the rebuilding of the security and governance structures of post-Assad Syria. Direct links to primary sources provided throughout.

• Aleppo

• Damascus

• Coast

• Homs

• Hama

This week was defined by a significant number of government operations and arrests across the country, but with a significant increase in Latakia. Security forces uncovered several major weapons caches in the Jableh and Qardaha regions, including one with hundreds of professionally made explosives and another with scores of mortars. More interestingly, for the first time since December, steady arrests have been made in Latakia of regime-era criminals. This development comes after the appointment of a new security official in charge of the government.

Elsewhere, security forces seem to have renewed some operations in western Homs. Reporting of the details is mixed, with some government-affiliated media pages claiming that negotiated weapons hand overs were conducted while some local and anti-Damascus pages reported that mass arrests and sectarian abuses occurred (with most of those arrested released a day or two later). It is not clear yet if these will remain isolated operations and violations, but if they continue then there is a real risk of inflaming tensions in this region again like what happened in January.