The Honored No. (23) Michelle Kilo

• Michel Kilo was born in the city of Latakia in 1940 into a Christian family. His father was a police officer, and his mother was a homemaker.
• He received his education in Latakia and worked at the Ministry of Culture and National Guidance.
• He served as the head of the Freedoms Center for the Defense of Freedom of Opinion and Expression in Syria.
• He was active in the Committees for the Revival of Civil Society.
• Kilo was one of the participants in drafting the Damascus Declaration.
• He was a former member of the Syrian Communist Party.
• He worked as a political analyst, writer, translator, and head of the Union of Syrian Democrats.
• Kilo translated several political thought books into Arabic, including “Imperialism and Reproduction,” “The Big House,” “The Language of Politics,” and “Social Consciousness.”
• He was arrested in the 1970s for several months.
• Afterward, he traveled to France until the late 1980s.
• He published some translations and articles and did not resume his activities openly until the Damascus Spring.
• He was arrested again on May 14, 2006, on charges of weakening national sentiment, undermining the prestige of the state, and inciting sectarian strife, following a retaliatory backdrop due to his signing (along with a group of activists and intellectuals) the Beirut-Damascus Declaration in May 2006.
• He was initially tried in a civilian court but was later transferred to a military court.
• In May 2007, the court sentenced him to three years in prison after convicting him of spreading false news, weakening national sentiment, and inciting sectarian divisions.
• Before his release, a group of activists, lawyers, media professionals, and intellectuals established the International Committee to Support Michel Kilo. This committee also created a defense body for Michel Kilo against the charges brought against him.
• He was released on May 19, 2009, five days after his three-year prison sentence ended.
• Among his publications are “The Theory of the State,” “Intelligence in World War II,” “Socialist Democracy,” “Berlin-Kabul-Moscow,” the translation of the first part of “From Hegel to Nietzsche: The Revolutionary Explosion in 19th Century Thought: Marx and Kierkegaard,” and “From Nation to Sect.”
• Kilo was involved in the Syrian revolution from its early stages and participated in the establishment of the “Democratic Forum” in 2012.
• At the end of September 2013, he contributed to founding the “Union of Syrian Democrats.”
• He became a prominent member of the “National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces” before leaving it in 2016.
• After withdrawing from the “Syrian Coalition,” he dedicated himself to writing for various newspapers and participating in television programs on Arab and foreign channels.
• He lived in exile in the French capital, Paris, until his death.
• Kilo passed away on Monday, April 19, 2021, in a hospital in the French capital, Paris, after contracting the coronavirus.

In the Syrian Future Movement (SFM), in recognition of his intellectual, political, and revolutionary history, his support for his fellow citizens in their revolution against oppression and tyranny, and out of our deep respect for Syria’s great figures, we are honored to present the Syrian Future Movement (SFM)’s symbolic Syrian Shield this week to the writer and politician “son of the nation” Michel Kilo, a symbolic shield that carries our vision and comprehensive national approach.