Syria: years after the disappearance of Rami Al Jadi and Anas Abdallah, their fate is still unknown

Rami Al Jadi and Anas Abdallah

In April 2016, Alkarama documented two more cases of enforced disappearance that took place in Syria in 2012 and 2013. The first case is that of Rami Al Jadi, a 25-year-old worker, who on 23 July 2012, was with two of his friends in a Damascus neighbourhood, when they were arrested by officers of the Syrian Army, who did not give any reason for the arrest. The families never received any official information on their fate and whereabouts. However, a former co-detainee reported that Al Jadi was detained in Sednaya prison, a prison under the control of the Military, where torture is routinely practiced, resulting in a high number of deaths, as documented by a recent report of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic (CoI). Nevertheless, when they reached out to Sednaya’s prison authorities, Al Jadi’s relatives had to face their refusal to provide any information.

A year and a half after Al Jadi’s abduction, on 20 December 2013, 37-year-old driver Anas Abdallah was driving a truck carrying a tea cargo from Latakia to Homs, when he was stopped at a checkpoint on the road, controlled by members of the Syrian Security Forces and the Popular Committees – local militias supported by the Government. He was immediately arrested and taken to an unknown location. After his disappearance, Anas’ family inquired about his whereabouts in several security branches, but to no avail. The owner of the truck he was driving is also not aware of his fate.

In view of these facts, Alkarama and Human Rights Guardians sent their cases to the United Nations Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID), in the hope that it will help shed light on their whereabouts.

For more information or an interview, please contact the media team at media@alkarama.org (Dir: +41 22 734 1008).