Bodies showing signs of torture found in hospital, Syrian rebels say
Syrian rebels say they have found about 40 bodies showing signs of torture in a military hospital in the Damascus area following the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad.
Video and photos showed the bodies wrapped in blood-stained white clothes piled up in a frozen room at Harasta Hospital on Monday.
Many of the dead bodies were seen with cuts and bruises on their faces and waists. Pieces of adhesive tape with numbers and names were also visible.
“I opened the cold door with my hands, it was a horrible sight,” Mohammed al-Hajj, a member of a rebel group in southern Syria, told AFP news agency.
He said the rebels went to the hospital after receiving a report from the staff about the bodies dumped there.
“We appreciate the [rebel] the military command of what we found and coordinated with the Syrian Red Crescent, which took the bodies to a hospital in Damascus so that the families could come and identify them.”
It was not clear how long the bodies had been kept in the cold but they were in different stages of decomposition.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based monitoring group, says around 60,000 people have been tortured and killed in Assad regime prisons.
Human rights groups say more than 100,000 people have disappeared since Assad ordered a crackdown on pro-democracy protests in 2011 that sparked civil war.
A Syrian non-governmental organization said the bodies in Harasta may be those of inmates from the notorious Saydnaya prison, north of Damascus.
“Harasta Hospital was the main center for collecting the bodies of detainees,” Diab Serriya, founder of the Association of Detainees and the Missing in Sednaya Prison (ADMSP), told AFP.
“The bodies will be sent there from Saydnaya prison or Tishrin hospital, and from Harasta, they will be transferred to mass graves,” he added.
The discovery of these bodies came at a time when the Syrian Civil Defence, whose nursing staff are widely known as the White Helmets, announced that they had completed a search operation that may have been held in secret cells or basements in Saydnaya prison without finding anyone.
Five special teams assisted by two K9 dog units and people familiar with the prison complex searched all buildings, basements, courtyards, ventilation shafts, sewage systems, surveillance camera cables and surrounding areas on Monday, as crowds gathered there in hopes of finding out. their lost relatives.
“The search did not reveal open or hidden areas inside the facility,” the Syrian Civil Defense said.
“We share the great disappointment of the families of the thousands who are missing and whose whereabouts are unknown,” he added.
Meanwhile, ADMSP shared what it said was an official document, dated October 28, which states that 4,300 prisoners are being held at Saydnaya.
They include 2,817 prisoners held in the prison’s “White Building” and 1,483 prisoners held for terrorism-related crimes and military courts in the “Red Building”.
“This number represents prisoners who were released when the prison was freed,” said ADMSP. The BBC could not immediately confirm the details.
Rebels broke into Saydnaya prison and Harasta hospital when they entered Damascus at the weekend, prompting President Bashar al-Assad to step down and flee the country.
ADMSP reported in a 2022 report that Saydnaya “became a death camp” after the start of the Syrian civil war in 2011.
It is estimated that more than 30,000 prisoners may have been killed or died due to torture, lack of medical care or starvation at the facility between 2011 and 2018.
It also revealed that released prisoners say at least 500 other prisoners have been killed between 2018 and 2021.
The ADMSP also explained how “salt chambers” were built to serve as a place to store dead bodies before they were transferred to Tishreen Hospital for registration and burial in the military cemetery.
Amnesty International used the term “killing house” to describe Saydnaya and alleged that the killings were authorized at the highest levels of the Assad government, and that such practices amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.
The Assad government dismissed Amnesty’s claims as “baseless” and “untrue”, and insisted that all executions in Syria followed due process.
On Monday night, the leader of the Islamist terrorist group whose attacks led to the end of Assad’s 24-year rule said former senior officials who oversaw the abuse of political prisoners would be held accountable.
Abu Mohammed al-Jolani of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) said that the names of the officials will be published and the repatriation of those who fled abroad will be demanded. Rewards will also be offered to anyone who provides information about their whereabouts, he added.
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