Executive summary

On 2 January, media outlets published an unverified draft copy of a public morality law issued by the Ministry of Interior of the Syrian Salvation Government (SSG) in Idleb. The draft law sets out a series of prohibited religious and moral practices, and contains provisions for the establishment of a Public Morality Police (PMP), recruitment for which is currently underway. From one perspective, this new legislation could constitute a means for Hay’at Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) to appease dissatisfied hardliners in areas under its control. Its terms do not, however, signal a radical departure from the status quo in these areas. The stringency with which the SSG intends or is able to implement the law also remains unclear. Irrespective of this, the draft law is expected to have an impact on daily life in SSG-held areas. Given the law's emphasis on preventing mingling between males and females in public and the workplace, its principal impact will likely be restricting women’s access to public spaces and employment opportunities. The draft law may also impact the work of humanitarian and development actors operating in SSG-held areas. In this report, CA-SYR attempts to analyze the challenges posed by the draft law, offering a non-exhaustive matrix of potential issues for NGOs, divided into three categories: direct, indirect, and tertiary challenges.