EPAWhite Helmets rescuers say they have completed their search for prisoners who may be held in secret cells or basements in Syria’s notorious Saydnaya military prison without finding anyone.
Special teams with the help of K9 dogs and people familiar with the building combed the jail and its grounds on Monday, as crowds of people gathered in hopes of finding their missing relatives.
“The investigation did not reveal any open or hidden areas within the facility,” White Helmet said in a statement.
The news emerged when the rebels claimed to have found about 40 bodies showing signs of torture in a hospital mortuary in the capital, Damascus.
Meanwhile, the leader of the Islamist terrorist group whose attacks led to the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad on Sunday said former senior officials who oversaw the abuse of political prisoners during the 13-year civil war will be held accountable.
Abu Mohammed al-Jolani said the names of these officials will be published and those who fled to other countries will be searched. Rewards will also be offered to anyone who provides information about their whereabouts, he added.
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.
EPAThe Association of Detainees and the Missing in Sednaya Prison (ADMSP) said in a 2022 report that the prison “became a death camp” after the conflict began.
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 ancient corpses before they were transferred to the Tishreen Military Hospital in Damascus to be registered and buried in a military cemetery. They say that the families of those arrested have never been given their bodies.
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.
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