Red Cross undertakes limited inspection of Syrian jails

Syria has opened its main prison in Damascus to the Red Cross Damascus – Agencies Syria has opened its main prison in Damascus to the Red Cross, the organization said, a move that could help reveal the fate of some of the thousands detained since the start of a five-month uprising. The announcement came on Monday as forces and militiamen loyal to President Bashar al-Assad killed at least 10 civilians across Syria on Monday in assaults to end pro-democracy protests and to stop refugees fleeing the bloodshed from crossing to Turkey, activists and residents said.
The ICRC visits people in places of detention worldwide from Gaza to Guantanamo to assess their conditions of detention and treatment.
But its confidential findings are shared only with the authorities concerned, which human rights activists warn could diminish the impact of the visits. Many people who have been rounded up or disappeared are being held in schools and factories which may be off-limits to the ICRC, they add.
“We know that there are more than 15,000 detainees who are not in the formal prisons, among them five of my relatives,” Radwan Ziadeh, a Washington-based Syrian exile and activist, told Reuters.
The International Committee of the Red Cross said its officials visited detainees in the central prison in the Damascus suburb of Adra in an “important step forward” to fulfill its humanitarian activities in Syria.
“The Syrian authorities have granted the ICRC access to a place of detention for the first time. Initially, we will have access to persons detained by the Ministry of the Interior and we are hopeful that we will soon be able to visit all detainees,” ICRC President Jakob Kellenberger said in a statement issued at the end of a two-day visit to Damascus.
Human rights campaigners say Syrian forces have arrested tens of thousands of people since the uprising demanding political freedom and an end to 41 years of Assad family rule erupted in March, with many being housed in security police buildings off limits to the ICRC, whose reports are not public.
A Syrian lawyer, who did not want to be identified for fear of reprisals, said the Red Cross needed to have access to unofficial jails and detention centers to see torture chambers and the extent of human rights violations in the country.
“The Damascus central prison is mostly for criminal, not political cases. The bulk of the ugliest torture takes place in the cellars of secret police branches spearheading the repression, such as Military Intelligence and Air Force Intelligence,” he said.
The International Committee of the Red Cross said its officials visited detainees in the central prison in the Damascus suburb of Adra in an "important step forward" to fulfil its humanitarian activities in Syria.
"The Syrian authorities have granted the ICRC access to a place of detention for the first time. Initially, we will have access to persons detained by the Ministry of the Interior and we are hopeful that we will soon be able to visit all detainees," ICRC President Jakob Kellenberger said in a statement issued at the end of a two-day visit to Damascus.
According to Amnesty international, the London-based human-rights group, the number of deaths in Syrian prisons rose sharply in 2011, describing it as one of the "most shocking features" of the regime's crackdown.
"No less than 88 such deaths have been reported to Amnesty International as occurring during the period from April 1 and August 15," including 10 children aged between 13 and 18, Amnesty International said at the end of August.
For at least 52 of them, it said, "there is evidence that torture caused or contributed to the deaths".
On the ground, there appears to be no let-up in the crackdown on pro-democracy supporters.
Security forces raided homes and made sweeping arrests in villages near the Turkish border during a manhunt for an attorney general who recently joined the country's protest movement, activists said.
The search for Adnan Bakkour, the most senior Syrian official to defect to the opposition, came after he appeared in a video last week criticising the government for its violent crackdown on dissent and announced his resignation.
In Deraa city, cradle of the uprising, heavy army and security presence made it more difficult for protesters to take to the streets but residents reported several smaller demonstrations in some neighborhoods in which hundreds of youths took part, they said.
In the northwestern province of Idlib, Adelsalam Hassoun, 24, a blacksmith, was killed by army snipers on Monday just after he had crossed into Turkey from the village of Ain al-Baida on the Syrian side, his cousin told Reuters by telephone from Syria.
“Abdelsalam was hit in the head. He was among a group of family members and other refugees who dashed across the plain to Turkey when six armored personnel carrier deployed outside Ain al-Baida and started firing their machineguns into the village at random this morning,” Mohammad Hassoun said
Thousands of families fled their homes in the northern border region in June when troops assaulted town and villages that had seen big protests against Assad.
More than 2,200 people have been killed in Syria since almost daily mass protests began on March 15, according to the United Nations, and activists say over 10,000 have been arrested.
on the other hand, Syria’s minority Kurds support the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad because it could usher in democracy but long-standing grievances have to be addressed in any post-Assad order, Kurdish activists said.
In a declaration issued on Monday at the conclusion of a conference in Stockholm to unify Kurdish efforts against Assad, the activists said they will strengthen backing for Kurdish protests against Assad, led by a younger generation of street leaders critical or elders in established Kurdish parties.
“The Kurdish people, as a part of Syria’s diverse mosaic, are a main component of the revolt against the regime and it is in their full interest for the regime to fall,” the statement said.
With Syria’s one million Kurds concentrated in the oil- producing northeast, the Kurdish issue would loom large if Assad, who is struggling to contain a five-month uprising against his rule, was removed, with regional implications for Turkey, which also has a large Kurdish minorities, and Iraq, where Kurds have a large degree of autonomy.
Syria’s overall population is around 20 million.