Anwar Bunni picked up the phone after just two rings. It was December 8, the day Syrian rebels ousted President Bashar Assad and took control of Damascus.

Bunni, head of the non-profit Syrian Centre for Legal Studies and Research, has spent more than a decade collecting testimonies on crimes committed against Syrians and building cases of crimes against humanity under the Assad government. He was expecting a call from a contact in the German government to hear about his request to go back to Syria without losing his refugee status in the European nation.

"We need to go back, I need to go back and rebuild the country," he told DW by phone from Berlin. "Everybody wants to go and have a look. Some may come back and resume their lives here, but others will return either now or after they have rebuilt their homes and societies."

Syrians across Europe celebrated Assad's ouster, but many are unsure conditions on the ground are suitable for their return. According to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), 90% of the Syrian population inside Syria needs humanitarian aid. More than 40% of hospitals are not fully functional, according to UN-Habitat, and a World Bank report found that 96% of people live off less than $7 (€6.75) a day in the war-ravaged nation.

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Less than a month after Syrian rebels took charge of........

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