Syrian Intelligence recruited activists to spy on opposition: leaked documents

(By George Hadad; Translation by Yusra Ahmed)

(Zaman Al Wasl Leaks)- In 2012, Syrian regime’s intelligence arrested Salah Shamiyeh, a well-known human Right activist. At that time, his arrest had mobilized the international human rights organizations to demanding his release.

However, 3 years later, a top secret document leaked from the Syrian intelligence showed that Shamiyeh was an agent for the regime’s intelligence since 2008.

The document was a written statement by Salah Shamiyeh, dated on 28/4/2014, in which he confessed that he was an intelligence agent since 2008.

The statement was signed and finger-printed by Shamiyeh, showed his confession of working to Lieutenant colonel Hosam Ashram for 4 years as an “agent” for the intelligence branch, to provide them with information about the opposition. Salah’s relations with the branch were restricted to Ashram and his deputy Ahmed Sheikh Ahmed and he provided information about opposition’s meetings and conferences abroad.

Shamiyeh mentioned in his statement that he met Ammar Qurabi, the prominent opposition figure, and became his friend, moreover, Qurabi convinced him to enroll in the National Organization for Human rights as its work was restricted to humanitarian issues and did not work in political issue.

Shamiyeh mentioned that he was a member of the Euro-Mediterranean Human rights Network and Ammar Qurabi convinced him to join.

Shamiyeh detailed his activities during recent events in Syria and revealed that he was one of the earliest source of information from the opposition by breaching their meetings in Idllib. He confirmed that he attended 4 meetings for the National Opposition Gathering, which were held after agreement of Idlib’s governor and Major-General commander of the operation room in the city, who facilitated meetings of Sheikhs and the civil committee. “I had forwarded written reports about meetings to Lieutenant Colonel Hosam and I had mentioned that I was not responsible for any decision taken in those meetings” he highlighted.

In regard to Syrian Opposition’s meeting in Ankara, Shamiyeh confirmed that he had not attended the meeting and he was surprised for including his name with the attendees, but he mentioned that Ammar Qurabi added his name to help him to be famous. He did not forget to mention in the statement that he had discussed Ankara’s meeting with the Lieutenant Colonel and how his name was inserted among attendees.

Shamiyeh mentioned in his statement that he participated in Lawyers’ sit-in at the Court in Idlib for 15 minutes, but he confirmed that he did not incite people to participate in demonstrations, to contrary he spoke in public against what so called “Revolution”, resulted in threatening him subsequently. Once again, he confirmed that he discussed all those matter with his head.

The important piece of information in Shamiyeh’s statement was that his confirmation of working officially with the branch 231 of intelligence under an “agent file" of Nasif Hilal. This fact contradict the possibility of writing the statement under pressure like others. Especially when Zaman al-Wasl obtained another document confirmed that an agent called Nasif Hilal worked with branch 231 and gave numbers of reports provided by himself about latest development and demonstrations in the area.

Shamiyeh had forwarded 3 reports to the intelligence branch, 2 of them were information about two activists, and in the third he reported a meeting of the Syrian opposition in Orient Restaurant.

Shamiyeh’s detention in March 2012 was faced with huge condemnation and demand of releasing him because he was considered a prominenthHuman rights activist.

However, Shamiyeh’s statement showed that his arrest was nothing more than misunderstanding because he was an official agent for the intelligence.

Front line defenders, the Arab Euro Centre for Human Right and International Law and the Palestinian Association of Human Rights condemned Shamiyeh’s detention and demand urgent reveal of his fate and confirmation of his safety.

The interest in Shamiyeh’s detention as an important human rights activists reached to the limit of forwarding a message to Bashar al-Assad’s office and held him responsibility of his safety.