Assef Shawkat

Assef Shawkat (‎; 15 January 1950 – 18 July 2012) was a Syrian military officer and intelligence chief who was the Deputy Minister of Defense of Syria from September 2011 until his death in July 2012. He was the brother-in-law of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, having married his older sister Bushra.

He and three other top Syrian government officials were killed on 18 July 2012 in Damascus during a deadly bomb attack allegedly organized by the Free Syrian Army, a coalition of Syrian opposition rebel groups. Shawkat was a key suspect in a terrorist attack in Beirut that killed Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri on 14 February 2005. US Department of Treasury had sanctioned Shawkat in 2006 for orchestrating the assassination, describing him as "a key architect" of the Syrian occupation of Lebanon.

Early life and education Assef Shawkat was born into a Alawite family in the village of Al-Madehleh, a predominantly Alawite village, in the Tartus Governorate of Syria on 15 January 1950. He grew up in modest comfort and studied law and history at Damascus University before joining the Syrian Army in the early 1970s. During this time, Shawkat married and had five children.

Military career After joining the army, Shawkat began working his way up through the ranks, and by 1982 he was an officer in the Defense Companies paramilitary force headed by Rifaat al-Assad, the brother of Syrian President Hafez al-Assad. The Defense Companies were responsible for putting down an Islamist uprising in the city of Hama in 1982.

In 1983, after Hafez al-Assad suffered an apparent heart attack, he named governing council of six men he believed were unlikely to seize power to run the country in his absence. Rifaat al-Assad was not among them. Hafez al-Assad's prolonged absence caused supporters of Rifaat al-Assad to rally around him, and in 1984 Rifaat launched a bid to take control of Damascus which nearly escalated into a civil war. The tensions only eased when Hafez al-Assad, still ill, addressed the nation and the attempted coup d'état collapsed. Shawkat remained loyal to Hafez al-Assad throughout this period, and he was rewarded with a promotion to colonel.

After his marriage to Bushra al-Assad, Shawkat built a close relationship with her brother Bashar, who had recently been recalled from London after his brother Bassel's death to be groomed as his father's successor. Bushra reportedly nurtured this relationship. On the other hand, he is said to have had a fractious relationship with Bushra's and Bashar's younger brother Maher al-Assad, who is alleged to have shot him in the stomach in 1999.

Political career By the time Bashar al-Assad became President of Syria in June 2000 after the death of his father, Hafez al-Assad, Shawkat was widely considered one of the most powerful people in Syria. In 2001, Shawkat was named Deputy Director of Military Intelligence, one of the main branches of the Syrian intelligence apparatus. His portfolio included liaising with militant Palestinian groups, such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad, and he was a key architect of Syria's dominance of Lebanon. After the 11 September 2001 attacks, Shawkat was a primary contact with intelligence agencies in the United States and Europe and coordinated a US intelligence operation in Syria, which was shut down after relations between the two countries irremediably deteriorated. Shortly before his promotion, former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri was assassinated by a car bomb in Beirut on 14 February 2005. The size and sophistication of the device used in the blast was considered to have involved a state intelligence agency, and United Nations investigators implicated Shawkat in the plot. He was subsequently administratively detained, and in July 2009, he was dismissed as head of military intelligence, 'thus ridding the regime of the key suspect in the international investigation into Hariri's assassination', given the rank of general and named as deputy chief of staff of the armed forces.

He held this post until September 2011, when he was appointed deputy defense minister, ostensibly under General Dawoud Rajiha. After the appointment of General Dawoud Rajiha to head the ministry of defense, Shawkat became an important figure in the ministry of defense, though the army was under the de facto control of Maher al-Assad, the president's brother. However, Shawkat had more than one conflict with Maher al-Assad.

Assassination On 18 July 2012, Shawkat attended a meeting of the Central Crisis Management Cell (CCMC) at the headquarters of Syria's national security council in the Rawda Square of Damascus.

Syrian state television reported that an honorific state funeral ceremony was held for him, Turkmani, and Rajha at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Damascus on 20 July 2012. Bashar al-Assad and his brother Maher al-Assad did not attend the ceremony. Shawkat was buried in the Tartus region following a funeral attended by his wife Bushra al-Assad and his mother-in-law, Anissa al-Assad, the widow of Hafez al-Assad.

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani sent his condolences to Bashar al-Assad upon death of Assef Shawkat.