Torture survivors in Syria struggle for care and justice after Assad's fall, Amnesty says

Six months after the fall of Bashar al-Assad's regime, survivors of Syria's notorious detention centres, including the infamous Saydnaya military prison, are facing a dire lack of medical, mental health, and legal support, Amnesty International warned in a new report released Thursday to mark the International Day in Support of Victims of Torture.

The human rights group said many survivors were grappling with long-term physical injuries, post-traumatic stress disorder, and other psychological effects, but are being left to fend for themselves in a country where much of the health system has collapsed.

Some detainees have resorted to pooling money just to afford basic medical tests like MRIs, according to survivors interviewed in Damascus.

Foreign aid cuts

Amnesty's report comes amid growing frustration among survivor-led groups, who say foreign aid cuts, particularly from the US and Europe, have severely undermined their ability to provide rehabilitation services just as thousands of detainees are being released.

"Right at the time that people were being released from detention centres, the funding stopped," said Muhannad Younes from Ta'afi, a survivor-run rehabilitation group that lost 60 percent of its funding after US aid was suspended.

Survivors and advocacy groups are calling for a survivor-centred approach to reparations, including long-term health and psychological support, legal accountability for perpetrators, and memorialisation of what they endured.

More than 100,000 people are estimated to have been forcibly disappeared under Assad's rule, during which the regime used arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances, and torture as tools to crush dissent.

Amnesty has also reported abductions, torture, and summary executions by former armed opposition groups in Aleppo and Idlib, and noted that in 2024, tens of thousands were arbitrarily detained by Kurdish-led authorities in Northeast Syria, many held in inhumane conditions.

While Syria's post-Assad government has banned torture under a new Constitutional Declaration and created a Transitional Justice Commission, Amnesty says much more is needed to ensure real justice.

Survivors continue to demand prosecutions of those responsible for mass torture, extortion, and enforced disappearances, which Amnesty describes as crimes against humanity.

"We were placed somewhere behind the sun and subjected to horrors," said Ahmed Helmi, a former detainee. "What we went through can only have meaning if it ensures this never happens again."