Ali Mamlouk is a special security adviser to Bashar al-Assad. Mamlouk helped establish the Air Force Intelligence Branch (AFID) and led its Investigations branch; he eventually became the director of the agency. Then, in 2005, Mamlouk was appointed the head of the General Intelligence Directorate (GID) and worked to expand the monitoring methods to repress public freedoms in Syria. In 2012, he was appointed the Head of the National Security Bureau, and thereafter became the Vice President for Security Affairs in 2019, title he currently holds.

Given Mamlouk’s vast experience with technologies of repression, following the outbreak of peaceful protests in March 2011, Bashar al-Assad entrusted him with the task of repressing the demonstrations. Mamlouk is directly responsible for the crimes, including gross human right violations, committed by the GID from 2011 to mid 2012. He is also responsible for all the crimes – including torturing and killing hundreds of thousands -, committed by all of the four intelligence directorates: AFID, GID, Military Intelligence Directorate (MID) and Political Security Directorate (PSD).