A Paris court on Friday ordered life jail terms for three top Syrian security officials for complicity in crimes against humanity and war crimes in a landmark case.
It is the first time that France has held a trial on abuses committed during Syria's civil war since 2011.
The accused -- Ali Mamlouk, former head of the National Security Bureau; Jamil Hassan, former director of the Air Force intelligence service; and Abdel Salam Mahmoud, former head of investigations -- were all absent, but there are international warrants for their arrest.
"It is a verdict that will resonate for hundreds of thousands of Syrians who are still waiting for justice," said Clemence Bectarte, a lawyer for some of the victims in the case.
The three were accused over their role in the deaths of two French Syrian men, Mazzen Dabbagh and his son Patrick, arrested in Damascus in 2013. The two were never seen again and declared dead in 2018.
At the time of his arrest, Patrick Dabbagh was a 20-year-old arts and humanities student at the University of Damascus. His father Mazzen was a senior education adviser at the French school in Damascus.
Ahead of the trial, the investigating judges said it was "sufficiently established" that the two men "like thousands of detainees of the Air Force intelligence suffered torture of such intensity that they died".
Syria's conflict since 2011 has killed more than half a million people, displaced millions, and ravaged Syria's economy and infrastructure.
Trials into abuses in Syria have taken place elsewhere in Europe, notably in Germany. In those cases, the people prosecuted held lower ranks and were present at the hearings.