Counting the Disappeared of Syria

In the wake of Syrian rebels having overthrown Damascus and President Bashar al-Assad having fled to Moscow, families rushed to the country’s most notorious prison, Saydnaya, to try and find out the whereabouts of their missing loved ones. Amnesty International estimates that thousands of people were systematically killed in Saydnaya during custody.

According to a report released by The Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR), at least 157,634 people arrested in Syria since March 2011 were still under arrest and/or forcibly disappeared as of August 2024. This includes at least 5,274 children and 10,221 women.

The Syrian regime forces are identified as responsible for more than 86 percent of these disappearances (136,614 cases), while the self-proclaimed Islamic State are thought to have carried out 8,684 disappearances, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) 5,281, all armed opposition factions/Syrian National Army (SNA) 4,371 and the Hay’at Tahri al-Sham (which is an alliance of Fateh al-Sham Front and a number of armed opposition factions) 2,684.

While these incidents peaked in the years 2012 (when 21,635 people disappeared) and 2013 (19,973 people disappeared) and have trailed off in recent years, they have continued into 2024, with 407 people recorded as having disappeared as of August 2024. The areas with the highest numbers of disappearances in the past 12 years are the Damascus suburbs, followed by Aleppo, Damascus and Deir Ez-Zour.

Enforced disappearances are defined as when “persons are arrested, detained or abducted against their will or otherwise deprived of their liberty by officials of different branches or levels of Government, or by organized groups or private individuals acting on behalf of, or with the support, direct or indirect, consent or acquiescence of the Government, followed by a refusal to disclose the fate or whereabouts of the persons concerned or a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of their liberty, which places such persons outside the protection of the law.”

The SNHR counts a person as forcibly disappeared when they have been arrested and their families have been unable to obtain information from official authorities about their arrest or whereabouts for at least 20 days, with the authorities refusing to acknowledge the arrest.