As part of his promised "reforms", President Assad recently set up a committee to look into the question of ending Syria's 48-year state of emergency.

The committee is not due to complete its work until April 25 but on Saturday the state-run television broadcast a panel discussion of the issue, involving three Syrian legal experts. One of those taking part – Abboud Sarraj, professor of criminal law at Damascus University – is also chairing the president's committee, so his remarks may provide some early clues to the likely outcome.

On Sunday, the official Syrian news agency, Sana, issued alengthy report of the TV discussion (in Arabic) with a shorter 
summary in English.

The first point of note is that there seems to be no intention to abolish the emergency law itself, but to keep it in reserve. Sarraj argued that it is normal for countries to have such laws for use in times of war, "public disaster and chaos", etc. Emergency laws are "not like other laws", he said, because they only take effect when an emergency is declared.

The question, therefore – according to Sarraj – is how to end the state of emergency and thus put the emergency law into abeyance. So long as disturbances continue on the streets there is clearly no likelihood of President Assad declaring the emergency to be at an end, so it looks as if this will simply be dangled as a carrot to tempt the protesters into abandoning their struggle.

In the meantime, the committee is looking at "gaps" in the law that would arise if the state of emergency were lifted and what legislation might be needed to "ensure the maintenance of homeland security and dignity of the citizen". The problem with that is that it could easily end up replacing one set of restrictions with another – this time permanent ones as opposed to the emergency law's restrictions which, at least in theory, are supposed to be temporary.

One thing that is still unclear is the committee's view of the right to demonstrate. Dr Sarraj said that the "right to protest and to demand reforms cannot be denied by a state", but also spoke about a need to obtain permission so that the police can "protect the security of the demonstrators" and to have banners, flags, etc, approved by "the competent authorities".

Posted by Brian Whitaker, 11 April 2011