The Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR) has recorded at least 162 arbitrary arrests in May as thousands of students and state workers were forced to vote for Bashar al Assad for a fourth mandate.
Most of the arrests in Syria are carried out without any judicial warrant while the victims are passing through checkpoints or during raids, with the security forces of the regime’s four main intelligence services often responsible for extra-judicial detentions.
The Paris-based monitoring group said every detainee is tortured from the very first moment of his or her arrest and denied any opportunity to contact his or her family or to have access to a lawyer. The authorities also flatly deny the arbitrary arrests they have carried out and most of the detainees are subsequently categorized as forcibly disappeared.
At least 32 arrest cases, including children and women, were recorded in coastal Tartus province who had been trying to immigrate illegally to Cyprus.
Also in May, SNHR recorded the killing of 96 civilians, including 15 children, 11 women, by all conflict parties in Syria.
Last month witnessed a hike in civilian deaths as a result of landmine explosions in different provinces and regions of Syria, SNHR said.
The Syrian conflict has claimed 494,438 lives since it erupted in March 2011 with the brutal repression of anti-regime protests.
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