New testimony on 601 Slaughterhouse

Zaman al-Wasl obtained a new testimony on the horrors of the Syrian Holocaust in Assad’s detention centers and hospitals.

Our witness, A.H., worked at Martyr Yusuf Al-Azma Hospital, also known as al-Mezzeh 601 Military Hospital, when Brigadier General Ghassan Haddad was the director, before defecting and joining the Free Syrian Army.

The witness, who covered information that was previously documented in the Caesar photographs, said that he served alongside one Ahmed Raslan, a recruit who tortured detainees.

The witness described the Trauma Unit in the hospital as an unequipped building, with 7 dormitories, each 6 meters in length and 5 in width holding 30 iron-frame beds and about 80 detainees, fully or half naked, most of them arrested during peaceful demonstrations. Every two beds were pushed together with 8 detainees chained to them. They were only allowed to relieved themselves once a day, which forced many to urinate and defecate on themselves and others.   

“They were tied with metal chains to the beds in inhuman conditions in a prison that was not suitable for humans. I had to wear 5 to 6 facemasks on top of each other to fight the smell. I worked there for 4 months, during which I gained the confidence of intelligenceofficers overseeing the detainees, because of my commitment to the work I had to do: feeding the detainees without interfering in other matters. So, they eased the surveillance on me going in and out of the dormitories. The detainees started to trust me after I increased their food rations and felt safer merely because I did not torture or insult them,” said the witness. “The officers used to steal the food intended for the detainees, leaving them only moldy bread and leftovers.

“Every day, two or three people died in these dormitories, and their bodies were thrown in the toilets on top of each other. When they reach 4 or 5 bodies, a car collected and threw them in the orchards of the city of Moadamiya.

“I felt sorry for them and because of what I witnessed day in and day out in there, I decided to defect. I confessed to a colleague of mine, whom I trusted, and who felt the same way. I suggested we defect together but he told me he was coordinating his defection with another party. So, he went his own way and I went my own at the end of 2012, heading to the southern neighborhood of Damascus.”

According to a report by the Syrian Network of Human Rights (SNHR), over 14,000 individuals died due to torture in the Syrian regime’s detention centers since March 2011.