Media and Humanitarian news sources in Damascus have reported that the Attorney General Military has sent a death certificate to the family of the detainee Khoshnaaf Suleiman. They were told that Khoshnaaf died on 31/3/2003, without presenting any additional details about his death and the reasons that led to it. In addition, the corpse of their son was not handed to them, and they were not told of the location of his burial.

Mr. Khoshnaaf Suleiman was arrested in September 1998 upon his arrival from Moscow after completing his studies in Pharmacy. He was accused of being a member of the Kurdish Working Party, and transferred to Sednaya Military Prison where his family visited him six months following his arrest. News circulated that he was still alive in 2005. Khoshnaaf Suleiman was married to a Russian woman, from whom he had one daughter.

The Syrian Human Rights Committee (SHRC) calls upon the Syrian authorities that had a connection with this case to deal with it with full transparency, and to reveal all details that led to the death of Khoshnaaf Suleiman. SHRC also requests that his place of burial be revealed, as well as to give his family the freedom to move his remains to the family graveyard. This is considering that deaths in Sednaya are a sensitive issue, due to the bloody events that have taken place, beginning from 5/7/2008.

SHRC also expresses its extreme distaste that it took the Syrian authorities five years and a half to inform the deceased’s family of his death! SHRC also takes this opportunity to call upon the authorities to inform the families of more than 17,000 individuals that have disappeared in Syrian prisons and detentions of the fate of their loved ones, and put an end to the fear, anxiety and confusion these families endure.

Syrian Human Rights Committee
5/9/2009