Tareq Mahmoud Haroun, from Douma city in Eastern Ghouta in eastern Damascus suburbs, was arrested by Syrian regime forces in a raid on his home in Douma city on August 10, 2018, and has been classified as forcibly disappeared ever since, with the Syrian regime denying his detention and refusing to allow anyone, even a lawyer, to visit him.
On September 28, 2022, Tareq’s family learned of his death inside a Syrian regime forces detention center in Damascus city; SNHR has obtained information confirming he was in good health at the time of his arrest, which makes it highly likely that he died due to torture and lack of medical care.
SNHR can further confirm that the Syrian regime failed to hand Tareq’s body over to his family; this is standard practice for the regime, with the bodies of the majority of detainees who die in its detention centers being disposed of through mass cremations. Since the whereabouts of these prisoners’ remains is unknown and they are not handed over to their relatives, these detainees continue to be classified as being among the forcibly disappeared.
We can confirm that 135,253 Syrian citizens are still detained or forcibly disappeared in Syrian regime forces detention centers.
SNHR notes that 14,464 Syrian citizens are documented as having died due to torture inside the Syrian regime’s detention centers.
