Damascus protesters call on Lebanese government to release Syrian detainees

Families of Syrian detainees in Lebanese prisons demonstrated outside Lebanon’s embassy in the Mazzeh neighbourhood of Damascus on Friday afternoon calling for their release.

The demonstrators said Syrians fled the brutality of the ousted Assad regime only to find themselves victims of other violations at the hands of Lebanese authorities, according to the organising body, the Syrian Revolution Detainees Association (SRDA).

"We demand that the Lebanese government release prisoners of conscience immediately. This measure not only represents the end of the detainees' tragedy, but also the beginning of a new page based on justice, love, and peace among our brothers," one organiser said in a speech.

Participants emphasised that Lebanon’s central Roumieh Prison "has become a symbol of the suffering of detainees whose only crime was the peaceful expression of their opinions and beliefs."

They said that the issue of Syrian prisoners of conscience "is not an individual or local matter, but a global humanitarian issue that requires broad international solidarity."

Muhannad al-Ghandour, a former detainee at the notorious Sednaya prison and director of the SRDA in Damascus, told Al-Araby Al-Jadeed: "We stand today to raise the voices of the children and women of the political detainees in Roumieh prison. We call on the Lebanese government to look into the detainees' cases, and we demand that the Syrian government pressure the Lebanese side to release them.

"As freed detainees, we know the feelings of a detainee in any prison in the world, and we affirm our readiness to submit international legal files to reopen this case."

There are more than 2,100 Syrian inmates in Lebanon, representing about 30 percent of the country’s prison population.

Hundreds of them, accused of "terrorism" or related offences, have been brought before military courts.

Some Syrian detainees are held for alleged membership in extremist or armed groups that were opposed to former president Bashar al-Assad, toppled in a December rebel offensive after decades of rule.

There have been talks between Beirut and the new government in Damascus to repatriate hundreds of Syrian detainees, and Lebanese authorities say the case is still being worked on.

Lebanon is also seeking to uncover the fate of thousands of Lebanese who forcibly disappeared and went missing during the 1975-1990 Lebanese civil war, in which Syria, Israel and other powers intervened.