School uniforms for children hung on the door. Their academic workshops lay on their desks. Toys covered with dust still sat on the floor.
In this way, Naila al-Abbasi found her sister's apartment in Syria, almost 12 years after her six children and imprint in the secret network of prisoners and the detention of a former regime.
Al-Abbasi traveled from Saudi Arabia to visit the house in the Dummar Project, a wealthy neighborhood northwest of the capital of Syria, Damascus, February 25.
“The smell of murder fills the house. Walls and curtains sad, as if they mourn their separation, “wrote Al-Abbasi on Instagram.
She found every corner covered with dirt. The birds that flew home were scattered on the floor.
It used to be a bright and busy house for six children: Dima, 13; Entisar, 12; Nająja, 11; Alaa, 8; Ahmed, 6; and Layan, 1.
Hassan al-Abbasi, brother Rania, has been demanding information about his whereabouts.
He actively searched for children after the overthrow of Bashar Al-Assad's government in December last year. But his phones remained unanswered, without a word about the fate of his family since March 2013.
“The situation is very difficult because none of the children appeared and for the first time our family entered the house for 12 years,” said Hassan from CBC News from Ottawa, where he lives with his wife and children.
“It was very painful.”
Children probably transferred to orphanages
On March 9, 2013, members of the military intelligence of Assad arrested the husband of Rania Al-Abbasi, Abdul Rahman Yasin, in their home, before returning to total gold and money, grabbed three cars, computers and mobile phones, along with passports documents and ownership of their property and al-Abbasi.
Two days later, intelligence members returned to arrest al-abbasi along with her six children and secretary Majdoline al-Qada, who were with them at that time.
Parents were accused of providing humanitarian aid in need of a Syrian revolution that broke out in March 2011.
The al-Abbasi case quickly became one of the most visible in Syria, emphasizing the issue of disappeared stopped parents and children.
Hassan believes that children probably remained in Rania in detention facilities, in accordance with the reports of other detainees, before they are probably transferred to orphanages or childcare and deprived of their identity and family origin. But it was impossible to verify without access to the organization's documents.
The disappearance of complete families is one of the common atrocities committed during the brutal principle of Assad.
The Syrian Network of Human Rights said that it received reports of this practice a few years ago and that it allegedly concerned institutions such as SOS Children's Villages Syria.
IN statement To CBC News, on February 25, the organization said that “it recognizes concerns about children placed in care organizations, including SOS Children's Villages Syria, by the former government.”
“During the war, many children were unnecessarily separated from their families and placed by the authorities in alternative care services without proper documentation of their origin.”
Arrest of children, family “systematic”
Hassan said that his family paid thousands of dollars to prison officials and members involved in these operations for all information about Rania and her family, but every time they were left unforced information and without real knowledge about their place of stay.
He said that the aunt on the part of the father's father visited the Syrian detention facility in 2013 to ask for children to be released in months after they were detained. The aunt was then detained for three months.
“The arrest of children and families was systematic. The regime could return the children to his relatives, but instead threatened to arrest them if they speak, “said Hassan.
He said that the family hired a lawyer to look at their homes in 2022. After he found out that the regime places children detained or killed in their prisons. This also did not give any answers.
In subsequent years, Hassan was informed by an employee in one of the orphans that he recognized four out of six children Although their names have been changed. Despite trying to reach them, Hassan was unable to verify it.
“These children grew up in our home … If you killed them, send us some photos, at least we will know that they were killed”, Hassan, referring to people involved in the activities of the former regime.
At least 3,700 children have disappeared
The Syrian Human Rights Network claims that verified lists show that about 3,700 children have been forced to disappear by the Assad regime since 2011, although it suggests that this number is much higher – over 10,000.
At the end of January Snhr he cried The transitional government of Syria to conduct a “immediate and comprehensive” investigation into all organizations that children from the former regime received.
“Many relatives believe that arrested families – a child, mother and dad – that the regime killed them (all) … But there are so many children in these organizations,” said Hassan.
After the exile of former President Syria Bashar al-Assad, Hosni Korn says that there is no hope that his four sons who were arrested at the Summer of Arab Spring in 2013 are still alive.
SOS Children Villages said that only children with documentation in 2018 began to accept new management changes.
“We regret that not without the situation in which we found ourselves, when receiving children and clearly absorb such practices, because children should never be separated from their families, unless it is in their best interest,” the organization said in a statement.
The fate of Al-Abbasi remains unknown, along with hundreds of thousands of other Assad detained in prisons. Mass graves were discovered after the fall of the Assad regime, but the identification of the remains may take years.
The father believed that he was killed after a month in custody
Hassan said that his family thinks his brother -in -law was tortured and killed about a month after arrest. They came to this conclusion after the recognition of Abdul Rahman Yasin in one of the 53,000 photos shared by the Syrian police defect called “Cezara” for smuggling photos from Syria in order to document torture and brutal death in Assad's prison.
In the following years, Hassan said that relatives would ask people to visit the Al-Abbasi and Yasina home to check it and see what is left. But they were too afraid that he was still monitored or inhabited by intelligence officers.
Hassan said that his family's bigger problem is that children may not be in orphanages or even in the country.
“We have faith. If they died, they are martyrs. And if they didn't die, we're still looking for them, “he said.
“This is one disaster of many. Until now, we have not achieved the actual scope of these crimes – we have only achieved a part. “