These photos shared online show detainees released by Syrian regime forces on June 19, 2021, when the regime released 32 detainees, all of them from Damascus suburbs governorate, from its detention centers in Damascus governorate. The release was the result of a reconciliation process carried out by the regime in Damascus suburbs governorate.
The Syrian regime gathered all the detainees being released in a bus before releasing them in Kafr Batna town square in Damascus suburbs. According to family members, relatives and friends of the released persons and to the details on SNHR’s database, the released individuals had completed periods of detention ranging between one to three years, during which they were detained in dreadful conditions, being subjected to torture, denied any healthcare or medical treatment, and kept in overcrowded cells ever since their detention, which was carried out in all cases without any clarification or reasons being provided to the detainees and without any arrest warrants being issued. The photo also shows the clear deterioration in the health conditions of the gaunt released prisoners.
We believe that the situation for the detainees still incarcerated, who have been forcibly disappeared for eight or nine years – if they are still alive – is far worse.
We note that more than 131,000 individuals are still detained or forcibly disappeared in Syrian regime detention centers, constituting a grave threat to the detainees’ wellbeing, health and dignity, and we issue a distress call to the world to help ensure their fate is revealed.
