Law No. 148/1949 on the Syrian Penal Code, 1949.

The Syrian Penal Code, comprising 756 articles, establishes a comprehensive framework for criminal offenses, punishments, and precautionary measures. It provides for penalties such as imprisonment, forced labor, civil deprivation of political and civic rights, and various restrictive measures including supervised freedom, residency bans, and institutional placement. The code also regulates circumstances that may reduce, suspend, or extinguish criminal liability, including insanity, diminished capacity, self-defense, necessity, amnesties, pardons, rehabilitation, and statutes of limitation. Significant attention is given to crimes against state security, including espionage, disclosure of state secrets, and actions threatening national integrity. It criminalizes corruption, bribery, embezzlement, abuse of public office, perjury, false accusations, and obstruction of justice. The code further addresses issues of public morality and family protection by penalizing abortion, prostitution-related activities, kidnapping for immoral purposes, indecent acts, begging, vagrancy, and public intoxication. In the economic sphere, it punishes theft, extortion, fraud, commercial deception, market manipulation, check fraud, fraudulent bankruptcy, and violations of intellectual property rights. Overall, the code combines punitive, preventive, and corrective measures aimed at protecting public order, state authority, social morality, and economic integrity.
The Code contains specific provisions to protect natural resources. For example, Articles 731–734 protect water resources and related public infrastructure from unauthorized interference, damage, and pollution. They prohibit activities such as unauthorized groundwater extraction, excavations near waterways, alterations to watercourses without permission, encroachment on riverbanks and irrigation systems, and actions that obstruct the flow of public waters. The provisions also safeguard public water infrastructure, including dams, bridges, canals, and water pipes, from destruction or damage. In addition, they prohibit the contamination of public waters and protected springs through the discharge of harmful substances, waste, or other activities that could impair water quality or public use. Collectively, these articles aim to preserve water resources, ensure the proper functioning of water management systems, and protect public health and the environment.
Articles 592–595 aim to protect public and animal health by regulating disease control and preventing the distribution or possession of harmful or adulterated products. They penalize violations of epidemic and pest-control measures, as well as the adulteration or sale of spoiled or unsafe food, medicines, beverages, and agricultural or industrial products. The provisions extend liability to those who knowingly market or promote such harmful goods, including cases of repeated offenses. Harsher consequences apply when the contaminated products pose a direct risk to human or animal health, even if consumers are aware of the risk. Finally, the code also sanctions the unauthorized possession of such dangerous or adulterated materials, reinforcing preventive control over their circulation. Furthermore, animals are also protected in Articles 728 and 747–751و which establish protections for both domestic and wild animals by criminalizing acts of unnecessary harm, neglect, and interference. They define domestic animals as those living under human care and extend legal protection to animals generally by prohibiting their intentional killing without necessity, particularly when committed in circumstances involving the owner’s property or through especially harmful means such as poisoning. The provisions also address animal welfare by prohibiting mistreatment, overworking, abandonment, and neglect of domestic animals by their owners or caretakers. In addition, they discourage unnecessary cruelty toward wild animals in public settings. Finally, they protect animals from harm caused by trespass or unlawful entry onto cultivated or fenced land, reinforcing respect for both animal welfare and property rights.
Additionally, the Penal Code safeguards fair trade by criminalizing market manipulation. Articles 671 and 672 punish anyone who deliberately distorts prices of goods or traded shares through fraudulent means, such as spreading false information or issuing deceptive buy or sell orders. The offense is considered more severe when it involves essential foodstuffs (such as grains, sugar, oil, or meat), goods outside the offender’s professional activity, or when it is committed by an organized group of three or more persons.