UN experts on Monday called for an end to the arbitrary, indefinite detention of approximately 52,000 people in Syria.
The detained individuals—mainly concentrated in North East Syria—are those whom the Syrian government accused of membership to the extremist group Islamic State in Iraq and Levant (ISIL), with over 52,000 people currently held incommunicado without due process, 60% of whom are children.
Syria experienced the overthrow of the Bashar al-Assad regime in 2024, following the Assad family’s 40-year reign and a devastating 14-year civil war that resulted in mass human right violations and the systemic torture of thousands of people. While the territory formerly under ISIL control has been liberated, tensions had continued to brew between the Syrian National Army (SNA) and Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) when SDF began detaining individuals suspected of having ISIL ties in the north east region of the country. Both groups have since agreed to merge as part of interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s mission to unite Syria.
SDF’s arbitrary detentions have only added to the overall number of detentions and enforced disappearances throughout Syria during and after Assad’s rule, with estimates of over 112,000 individuals reported missing. Of those held in detention camps, the majority of people are not only ISIL suspects, but also children, families of suspects, orphans, refugees, internally displaced people, and human trafficking victims, with more than half of detainees being non-Syrian nationals.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) and UN experts—including several Special Rapporteurs and Independent Experts—have urged Syria to use the country’s political transition as an opportunity to devise a solution to this crisis, with the safe integration of prisoners back into the mainstream society. Human rights experts have also recommended that other countries support Syria by repatriating their own citizens who remain detained.