The release of detainees from notorious Syrian detention centers and intelligence branches such as Sednaya, Branch 235 (‘Palestine’), and Adra, marked a significant moment in Syria as thousands of detainees were able to reunite with their families. However, over 100,000 individuals remain under arbitrary arrest and/or enforced disappearance––and their whereabouts and fate are still unknown. Given these realities and lack of substantial support, families have taken matters into their own hands, searching through social media, detention centers, hospitals, and makeshift graveyards in desperate hope of finding traces of their loved ones.
As of August 2024, it was estimated that over 156,000 civilians were forcibly disappeared or subjected to arbitrary detention in Syria, with more than 136,000 individuals imprisoned in Syrian government detention centers. International and local human rights organizations have documented widespread practices in government-run detention centers that include torture, beatings, starvation, as well as mass hangings and killings of detainees.
Moreover, systemic sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) in Syrian detentions centers has also been documented, with impacts that are deeply gendered, multi-layered, and often long-term for survivors. While the vast majority of arbitrary detentions and enforced disappearances were carried out by former government forces, multiple armed groups have also perpetrated these crimes, including the current de facto ruling faction, Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS).
Most victims of arbitrary detention and enforced disappearance in Syria are men; however, the indirect impacts of arbitrary arrest and enforced disappearance disproportionately affect women. When the main male breadwinner of the family is forcibly disappeared, this places a heavy burden on women to provide incomes and support their families. This is particularly difficult given that Syrian women already have weaker access to financial resources and face systemic economic discrimination. Moreover, women relatives carry the psychological burden of searching for the whereabouts of the disappeared loved one and the continued need to advocate for their release. This amounts to an increased psychosocial toll on women as caregivers to children and other family members, as they often suffer from compounded psychological distress. And finally, women also face legal impacts as it means they cannot remarry, inherit, or travel with their children, given the need of consent of the husband or proof of his death.
Femena urges for a survivor-centric and gender-responsive transitional justice process, that takes into account the overlapping structural inequalities that have produced gendered impacts for women and other structurally excluded communities, whether as direct or indirect victims. Women and WHRDs, as detention survivors or advocates for their disappeared loved ones, must be recognized as essential contributors to truth-seeking, justice, accountability, and reconciliation processes.
Recommendations:
- Femena urges the international community, namely the United Nations (UN) agencies and the International Committee of the Red Cross and Red Crescent (ICRC), to step up their efforts to help search for those who remain missing. The search for the disappeared must not only be limited to former government-held detention centers, but international pressure must be placed on HTS to release prisoners held in detention centers in Idlib.
- We call on HTS and the international community to safeguard evidence for future justice and accountability processes. This includes prioritizing resources and expertise to exhume bodies in makeshift cemeteries according to forensic processes and standards.
- We urge for comprehensive and multi-faceted support to released detainees and the families of the disappeared must be prioritized. We call on international organizations to collaborate with local civil society groups, women-led organizations, and victims’ associations to ensure survivors and their families receive the needed care, protection, and reintegration support.
- We stress opportunities for detention survivors and families of the forcibly disappeared to participate in and lead justice and accountability processes to ensure their right to truth, closure, and reparations.
- We call for independent, impartial, and comprehensive justice and accountability processes that extend not only to the former Syrian government’s war crimes and crimes against humanity but to all perpetrators of international crimes.
Femena extends its unwavering solidarity to survivors of Syrian detention centers, and the families of forcibly disappeared persons in Syria, who continue to endure uncertainty and unfathomable suffering even after the fall of the Assad regime. We honor the resilience of Syrian families who continue their search for their loved ones and stand with all Syrians in their pursuit of a future built on justice, equality, and respect for human rights.