Syrian Arab Republic - April 2024

A report published in April by Amnesty International alleges that Islamic State (IS) suspects and their families held in detention facilities in the autonomous north-east region of Syria have been subjected to widespread human rights abuses by the authorities there. According to the report, many of the estimated 56,000 detainees had been tortured, suffering ‘severe beatings, stress positions, electric shocks and gender-based violence’ and that ‘thousands more’ had been disappeared. It also found that detainees were deprived of food, water and medical care and that some had died of suffocation in overcrowded cells. The detainees were incarcerated in the facilities following the territorial defeat of IS in Syria in 2019 and Amnesty International states that the vast majority are being indefinitely detained without charge or trial. In their response to the report, the Autonomous Authorities of the North East Syria Region criticised the countries whose nationals were detained in the facilities for failing to repatriate them.  While the detention facilities are run by the autonomous authorities, they were built and refurbished by a US-led coalition of 29 states.

Sources: Amnesty International, Associated Press News