In the name of Allah, the most Merciful and Compassionate
Ms. Zama Coursen-Neff
Executive Director, Children's rights division
Human Rights Watch
Dear Ms. Coursen-Neff,
Pursuant to your June 6, 2014 letter, we present you with our sincerest gratitude, for your interest in what takes place on the Syrian stage. We have conducted a field investigation as soon as we received your letter, and, going back to our records, found nothing to prove that Ahrar Al-Sham recruited children. Furthermore, some of the battalions mentioned in your letter were unknown to us, such as the Abdulrahman Al-Sham and the Fahd battalions. Also, working among our ranks is purely voluntary; we pay no salaries.
In consequence, the allegations that were the subject of your enquiry, that Ahrar Al-Sham recruits children, are untrue and did not hold to our investigations. The Islamic Front is prepared to cooperate with your esteemed organization, by investigating the individual cases you mentioned, if you can provide us with the full relevant data.
We would also like to inform you that we do not allow the recruitment or military use of children in any form, and have for that purpose issued both verbal and written instructions. And it does not stop with recruitment; we make a point of keeping children away from any location where violence or inappropriate acts might undermine their future moral or psychological wellbeing. We do that in the face of great difficulties, since the Assad's criminal regime bombs civilians indiscriminately, in their homes and in their shelters. We can also assure you that the Islamic Front's leadership directs all its fighters to protect children and civilians, even among the enemy's ranks. We seek to keep children on their desks in schools and kindergartens, although most of these were destroyed by the Syrian regime, under the war criminal Bashar Al-Assad, in retaliation from the children who, in Daraa, ignited the first spark of the Syrian revolution.
You should also know that we never arm a young man, or give him the opportunity to join the Front, including the Ahrar Al-Sham Islamic movement, except after a thorough check of his documents, to ascertain he's over 18. And while we thank Human Rights Watch for its vigilant efforts, we call upon the organization to perform a more comprehensive fact-checking in the preparation of its reports. You have already, on October 10, [2013?], published a report that we thought was regime-biased, and based on the accounts of one side, in the dispute in Latakia's countryside. Human rights abuses were attributed to Ahrar Al-Sham when the movement did not participate in them, and without recourse to us, as professional and rights standards dictate.
Hassan Aboud
Head of the political bureau, the Islamic Front