Syrian Observatory for Human Rights: 60,000 People Killed in State Prisons

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reports that at least 60,000 people have died in Syrian government prisons over the past five years due to torture or dire humanitarian conditions. Rami Abdulrahman, the director of this London-based group, told AFP that this number reflects deaths from March 2011 to the present, resulting from torture and harsh conditions, including lack of food or medicine. According to Abdulrahman, the highest mortality rate was in the notorious Sednaya prison, and detention centers of the Air Force Intelligence and state security agencies have had similar conditions. Human rights groups have consistently accused the Syrian government of widespread torture of its opponents. A UN investigation in February of this year accused the Syrian government of implementing a "policy of extermination" in its prisons. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights stated that at least 110 children are among the 14,000 names recorded as victims of torture by the Syrian government. The group also reported the deaths of "several thousand" prisoners by opposition groups such as the Islamic State (ISIS). In 2014, a Syrian government official who fled the country smuggled out about 55,000 photos of 11,000 individuals who were killed in government prisons during the first two years of the Syrian crisis. The crisis and war in Syria are among the largest humanitarian disasters in recent decades. Over the past five years, hundreds of thousands of people in the country have been killed and wounded, and millions have been displaced. In this context, the Assad forces' attack on the "Hama" prison to suppress a prisoner uprising has resulted in "13,000 people" dying under torture in Syrian government prisons. The UN Commissioner has stated that torture in Syria has become widespread. A new report details the "torture and killing of 11,000 prisoners" by the Assad regime, while Amnesty International reported the deaths of 88 people in Syrian prisons.