Syrians with Turkish citizenship ordered to visit notorious regime intelligence branch

Syrians who have acquired Turkish citizenship will be required to attend the notorious “Palestine Branch” of the Assad regime’s secret services, according to a leaked document from the regime’s Department of Immigration and Passports.

The document, shared by activists online, orders all immigration officials to transfer any Syrian with Turkish citizenship to the Palestine Branch in Damascus.

Its contents could not be verified by The New Arab.

The Palestine Branch of the Syrian regime's mukhabarat secret service, also known as Branch 235, has a reputation for torture and other serious violations of human rights.

Detainees held at the branch have been kept in cells the size of coffins, which are infested with cockroaches, rats, and fleas. They are given a minimal amount of food and denied medical care.

#Syria- Branch 235 of the Assad regime intelligence summons every Syrian who obtained Turkish citizenship after 2011.#Turkey #Türkiye
📸 pic.twitter.com/5bKp7b3qic

— Mete Sohtaoğlu (@metesohtaoglu) July 25, 2022

Mohammed Suleiman Dahla, a legal expert, told the Arabic news website Arabi 21 that the document was genuine, saying that the Assad regime wanted to deter Syrian refugees in Turkey from returning to their country.

Turkey currently hosts approximately 3.5 million refugees from the Syrian conflict, which broke out in 2011 following the Assad regime’s brutal suppression of peaceful pro-democracy protests.

Around 193,000 Syrians are estimated to have received Turkish citizenship as of 2021, but in recent years anti-Syrian racism has been on the rise in Turkey, with violent attacks on Syrian refugees and politicians from various parties talking openly of forcibly repatriating Syrians.

Dahla said the Syrian regime wants to prevent Syrian refugees returning from Turkey in accordance with a plan for "demographic change".

"With this order and other laws ostensibly about organisation and construction in cities, [the regime] wants to complete its plan for demographic change, in order to guarantee domination of Syria," he told Arabi 21.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and many of the regime's leading figures are from the country's Alawite minority, while most Syrians, including the regime's opponents, are Sunni Muslims.

The regime and its allies have been accused of trying to change Syria’s ethnoreligious make-up in order to remain in power.

However, Mustafa Hashem, a Syrian colonel who defected from the regime’s army, told Arabi 21 that the document was "routine", and aimed to gather information about how Syrians received Turkish citizenship.

He said the choice of the notorious Palestine Branch to interrogate them was simply part of the division of labour among various regime intelligence agencies.