At Great Risk, Group Gathers Evidence Of War Crimes In Syria
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William Wiley has made a career out of international criminal law, working on cases in Yugoslavia, Rwanda and Iraq. He now oversees a nonprofit called the Syrian Commission for Justice and Accountability (SCJA).
The group's men and women are charged with collecting evidence of atrocities in the Syrian war, evidence they hope will be used to prosecute war crimes carried out by both sides.
"There's no international body with jurisdiction over the crimes being perpetrated in Syria at the current time," he tells NPR's Rachel Martin. "The one advantage we have is that we can operate in the midst of the conflict, which a public body couldn't really do, for the simple reason that we have a much higher level of risk tolerance."
The SCJA uses different methods to suss out regime offenses and armed opposition offenses. At the regime level, "we're interested in quite high-level offenders," he says, "because criminal justice is a highly symbolic exercise."
“ It's a very committed group, it's very high-risk. I don't want to get all emotional, but certainly the courage of these men and women is to be applauded. There's no question about it.