Hill speaks about Syrian war, woes

U.S. Rep. French Hill marked the anniversary of the Syrian uprising Wednesday, speaking at an event titled “Nine Years of Atrocities in Syria: Civilians Still at Risk.”

The program, in the Capitol Visitors Center, was organized by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, as well as the Syrian Emergency Task Force.

The group’s executive director, Mouaz Moustafa, was born in Damascus but emigrated to the United States when he was 12 years old. He attended junior high school in Fort Smith, high school in Hot Springs, and college in Walnut Ridge and Conway before moving to the nation’s capital.

The crushing of largely peaceful protests by the regime of President Bashar Assad sparked a civil war that has unleashed years of death and devastation, critics say.

During his remarks, Hill blamed Assad and his loyalists for what he called “a great tragedy.”

“They burned the country. Twelve million people displaced, over a half-million people killed,” the Republican from Little Rock said.

U.S. lawmakers want it to end, he said.

“In Congress, you see a united bipartisan support for taking the actions to take Assad to the Hague,” he said, referring to the site of the International Criminal Court.

Lawmakers must also insist that President Donald Trump and the nation’s European allies “have a coherent plan and a coherent strategy for using our leverage to bring peace back to Syria.”

Hill has worked with Moustafa repeatedly since his election to Congress in 2014. He is also a member of The Friends of a Free, Stable and Democratic Syria Caucus.

“It’s been a cause that I care a lot about,” Hill said after Wednesday’s speech.

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