(Zaman Al Wasl)- Families of 25 detainees in southern town of Kanaker were saddened to receive a call from the Syrian regime’s reconciliation committee to get clothes and personal belongings of their sons from the notorious Saydnaya prison near Damascus.
The 25 men who revolted against Bashar al-Assad at the first years of Syrian uprising in 2011 were arrested like thousands more and deposed in the military security chambers and cells.
Local source told Zaman al-Wasl that the detainees were tortured to death in Saydnaya prison, one of the country's largest detention centres located 30km north of Damascus.
Zaman al-Wasl has obtained the names of the detainees. One of Kanaker residents assured to Zaman al-Wasl that his brother’s name is on the list. He was arrested five years ago by the Air Force Intelligence, he said.
Fate of thousands of detainees is still unknown as human rights activists fear they were executed or tortured to death.
Kanaker reached a reconciliation deal with the regime in 2016 where hundreds of rebels evacuated the town and the state facilities re-operated again.
In 2017, Amnesty International said about 13,000 people were hanged in five years at Saydnaya prison, accusing the regime of a "policy of extermination".
Titled "Human Slaughterhouse: Mass hanging and extermination at Saydnaya prison," Amnesty's damning report, released on Tuesday, is based on interviews with 84 witnesses, including guards, detainees, and judges, according to Al Jazeera.
It found that at least once a week between 2011 and 2015, groups of up to 50 people were taken out of their prison cells for arbitrary trials, beaten, then hanged "in the middle of the night and in total secrecy."
Amnesty accused the Syrian government of carrying out a "policy of extermination", repeatedly torturing detainees and withholding food, water, and medical care.
Prisoners were also raped or forced to rape each other, and guards would feed detainees by tossing meals on to the cell floor, which was often covered in dirt and blood, the report said.
Amnesty has previously said that more than 17,700 people were estimated to have died in regime custody across Syria since the country's conflict erupted in 2011.
Syria is not a member of the International Criminal Court. The only way the court could prosecute someone from Syria would be through a referral from the United Nations Security Council.
-‘Normal’ Death Certificates-
In recent weeks, the regime has been issuing death certificates for detainees tortured to death in the security chambers, an opposition advocate group told Zaman al-Wasl.
The Gathering of Free Syrian Advocates has provided Zaman al-Wasl with list contains names of 90 detainees said they were tortured to death as the regime ordered the Personal Status department in Hama province to issue death certificates for the detainees which ignore the reason of death.
The same order took place in Hasaka for 600 detainees who also died of torture.
The advocate group has submitted the list to the United Nations, saying the regime security centers are a place for a genocide and ethnic cleansing.
In mid 2013, a team of war crimes prosecutors and forensic experts, had analyzed 55 thousand digital photos taken and provided by a Syrian defector codenamed "Caesar," who, along with his family, is now living outside Syria in an undisclosed location, according to CNN.
The team members shared their findings in a joint exclusive with CNN's "Amanpour" and The Guardian newspaper on January 20, 2014.
The UN estimates that more than 400,000 people have been killed and millions have fled their homes since the conflict began with anti-Assad protests.
Zaman Al Wasl
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