Sednaya Prison
The Continual Human Tragedy
When will the chronic series of detention in Syrian come to an end?

Introduction

Sednaya civil prison is one of the largest and newest Syrian prisons. The Government finished building it in 1987. It is situated in the mountainous village of Sednaya, which lies north of the Syrian Capital, Damascus. The building consists of three floors in the shape of three wings that converge in the center assuming the shape of the “Mercedes emblem”. Every wing on each floor is composed of twenty collective cells, each 8 meters long and six meters wide. The first floor contains one hundred prison cells. Sednaya prison was built to accommodate, in normal circumstances, 5000 detainees, but the number may be increased to 10000 detainees when the prison is crowded.

The Syrian Government built the prison primarily to receive ordinary criminals, but it opened it from the first day to receive political detainees. In the prison there are interrogation bureaus supplied with the most modern and most developed torture instruments.

Torture in Sednaya prison

Information lately leaked from Sednaya prison does not say anything about practicing torture in Sednaya prison although torture was practiced in it during previous periods, which led, according to the witnesses of Human Rights Organizations, to the death of many detainees under torture. Not only that but those who passed by Palestine Branch and Sednaya prison regard Sednaya prison as a resting-place when compared with the inferno of Palestine Branch. The detainees are transferred to this prison after interrogation them in the security branches, such as Palestine Branch, the District Branch, or the Customs Branch, which are all in Damascus, or in the branches in the other Provinces. In these branches torture of various types is inflicted on the detainees under the supervision of interrogators from main security bodies: military, state security and political, in addition to other branches. After finishing the interrogations that may last for months or even years, the detainees are transferred to Sednaya prison, whether a sentence has been passed against them or they are still waiting for it to be announced. The detainees may be summoned to the intelligence branches of the security bodies if necessary, and there they receive their share of torture and mistreatment once again.

Political detainees and opinion detainees in Sednaya prison

The Syrian Human Rights Committee recognized the names of about 580 political and opinion detainees in Sednaya prison distributed as follows:

1. 356 detainees from the Muslim Brotherhood who have been in detention since the late seventies and early eighties of the twentieth century.  From the attached list it seems that a large number of them complain from serious and incurable diseases, such as cardiac diseases, blockage of arteries, hypertension, kidney diseases, rheumatism, etc. (There are 38 well-known cases of this type, according to the information of SHRC, and the number is apt to increase.) Another proportion that is deemed very large have lost their senses or become psychologically imbalanced because of the severe torture they had been subject to in Tadmur prison previously and because of lengthy detention. (17 well-known cases, according to available information, and the number may be larger.)

It is noted also that some of them were sentenced to a limited term of imprisonment that has been exceeded by many years, yet they have not been released, particularly those who were detained when they were young and were sentenced to a few years but have not been released though a quarter of a century has elapsed (about 30 cases, according to the available information).

Most of these have spent over one and a half times their ages when they entered the prison and have not been released. The list indicates that a decision was issued to release one of the detainees in 1979 but he has not been released till now, 25 years since the issue of the decision.

2. 175 detainees accused of miscellaneous charges. They include leftists, Palestinians belonging to Fath and the Popular Front, Iraqis, Bathists (Pan Arab Leadership), Salafi Islamists and those connected to al-Qa’idah and officers in the Syrian army. Some of these suffer from serious physical and psychological diseases because of the bad situations and the circumstances of their detention and the prolonged term of detention they have experienced. One of them (Imad Shihah) has been in detention for 30 years, since 1974. Some others were detained in the eighties, and a third group are relatively recent, for they have been in prison for only a few years.
 
3. 49 detainees belonging to al-Tahrir Party, who have been in prison since 1999.

Distribution of the detainees in Sednaya prison:

Each of the three floors of Sednaya prison is divided into two wings: right and left, and each wing is divided into (A, B and C).

First floor:

First floor, left:

A. Currently the wing accommodates one person.
B. Currently the wing accommodates some judicially sentenced persons.
C. The wing houses the sewing workshops.

First floor, right:

A. Currently the wing accommodates a number of political convicts, one of them being Dr. Abdul-Aziz al-Khair.
B. Currently the wing accommodates a number of detainees charged with various Islamic accusations. Among them are Salafis, Palestinians and members accused of having relations with al-Qa’idah and other accusations.
C. The wing is occupied by the rotating police staff and guards.

Second floor:

Second floor, left:

A. The wing accommodates Bathist detainees (Pan Arab Leadership), some convicts accused of spying or judicially sentenced for other offenses.
B. The wing accommodates detainees belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood.
C. The wing accommodates detainees belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood.

Second floor, right:

A. The wing accommodates Bathist detainees (Pan Arab Leadership), some convicts accused of spying or judicially sentenced for other offenses.
B. The wing accommodates Bathist detainees (Pan Arab Leadership), some convicts accused of spying or judicially sentenced for other offenses.
D. The wing accommodates detainees belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood.

Third floor:

Third floor: left:

A. The wing accommodates detainees belonging to al-Tahrir Party.
B. The wing is vacant.
C. The wing is vacant.

Third floor, right:

A. The wing accommodates prisoners convicted of smuggling.
B. The detainees call this wing “the black gate”, for the detainees in it are completely isolated from the outer world. The wing accommodates those involved in sensitive and serious questions, such as the detainees of al-Qa’idah and military officers.
C. The wing is vacant.

Director and Staff

The present director of Sednaya prison: Lieutenant Colonel Lu’ay Yusif (from the military police staff)

Chiefs of shifts round the clock:

1. First Adjutant: Ali Issa.
2. First Adjutant: Wa’il Isma’il.
3. First Adjutant: Muhammad Hassoun.

An appeal from the Syrian Human Rights Committee:

The Syrian Human Rights Committee appeals to the Syrian Authorities to put an end to the dossier of chronic detention in Syria and calls upon them to instantly release all the political, opinion and conscience detainees in Sednaya prison and all the other prisons, detention centers, and security and interrogation branches in Syria. It calls upon President Bashshar al-Asad to fulfill the promise he gave before the press and Arab and international mass media to solve the problem of the detainees more quickly than imagined. The Syrian Human Rights Committee deems the Syrian Authorities and President Bashshar al-Asad responsible for the continuity of this human tragedy. It also blames them for their continual violation of human rights, and reminds them that they should respect the right of the Syrian human being of expressing his opinion and should not pursue him because of his opinion or doctrine.

Appendix: A new list of the names of the detainees in Sednaya prison, May 2004