‘I want he lived lengthy sufficient to see the brand new Syria’: Crowds bury anti-Assad activist

Warning: This text comprises graphic particulars of torture

“We gave our blood and our soul to the revolution,” chanted the crowds as they carried Mazen Al-Hamada’s coffin by means of the streets of Damascus, draped within the inexperienced, white and black flag adopted by demonstrators in 2011, now omnipresent within the metropolis. for the reason that fall of Bashar Al-Assad.

Because the funeral procession progressed, increasingly more folks joined it. “Mazen is a martyr,” many shouted, some crying.

If the world knew earlier than then the extent of the Assad regime’s brutality towards its personal folks, it was partly due to Mazen, an activist who was an outspoken critic of the regime.

On Sunday, his physique was discovered within the well-known “slaughterhouse”, Seydnaya jail in Damascus. He bore marks of horrible torture.

A physician who examined him informed the BBC he had damaged bones, burn marks and bruises throughout his physique, allegations corroborated by Mazen’s household.

“It’s not possible to depend the accidents on his physique. His face was smashed and his nostril was damaged,” mentioned his sister Lamyaa.

Protesting at first of the rebellion in Syria in 2011, Mazen Al-Hamada was arrested and tortured. Launched in 2013, he was granted asylum within the Netherlands. He started to talk overtly about what he had suffered in jail.

In Afshar Movies’ documentary The Disappeared from Syria, Mazen describes how he was raped, his genitals pinched and his ribs damaged by a guard who frequently jumped on his chest.

Throughout his keep on the asylum, Mazen’s nephew Jad Al-Hamada says he started affected by extreme melancholy and different psychological well being points. Throughout this time, he was seen in a video claiming he was being threatened by members of Syria’s Kurdish ethnic minority and calling for violence towards them in response. His household says he was not of sound thoughts on the time.

In 2020, he determined to return to Syria.

“The federal government informed him that that they had a deal and that he could be protected. He was additionally informed that his household could be arrested and killed if he didn’t return,” Lamyaa mentioned.

He was arrested upon his arrival within the nation. And his household believes he was killed after rebels captured Hama final week, shortly earlier than the autumn of the regime.

“I am blissful that we’re free, however I want he had lived lengthy sufficient to see it. He paid the worth for our freedom,” Lamyaa mentioned.

Mazen’s story is only a small glimpse into the atrocities dedicated by the Assad regime. Greater than 100,000 folks went lacking throughout his reign, with most thought lifeless. Now their households are looking for their our bodies.

On the Damascus hospital, our bodies introduced again from Seydnaya have been deposited in a morgue, and once they ran out of area, essentially the most decomposed have been saved in a hangar-like construction simply exterior. The stench was overwhelming.

A physique was decapitated. The others bore marks of extreme torture.

In a single nook there was a plastic bag with a human cranium and bones. Households seemed by means of it to determine their family members.

The disfigured physique of Ahmad Sultan Eid, 19, was recognized by his mom and brother. His mom nearly collapsed after seeing him and the nurses took her to the emergency room.

“Oh boy, child, you have been solely 19,” she moaned. “We now have nothing left.”

Ahmad’s brother pressed his face towards a wall and cried.

Throughout us, folks held up pictures of the family members they have been in search of.

“I did not discover something. How will you discover something if you happen to look by means of skeletons?” mentioned Mustafa Khair-ul-Inam, an aged man who got here to search for his two sons Omar and Mohammad, who disappeared in 2011.

Amhad Masri, for his half, had come to choose up his brother Khalil.

“Till now we weren’t allowed to ask the place our family members are, in any other case we’d be arrested. Are you able to think about our emotions? They did nothing and left like that. Possibly they’re in a mass grave someplace. “Dwelling within the jungle was higher than dwelling in Syria,” he mentioned.

Grief and rage – which couldn’t be expressed overtly only a week in the past – have been pouring out.

“Each mom who’s in search of her son ought to take revenge on Assad. Putin mustn’t give him sanctuary. He ought to ship Assad again so we will execute him in a public sq.,” one girl shouted.

I requested Lamyaa, Mazen’s sister, what justice she wished for her brother.

“The perpetrators have all escaped. However I need them introduced again so we will get justice in court docket.”

Extra reporting by Aamir Peerzadaa, Sanjay Ganguly and Leen Al-Saadi