Submitted by crinadmin on
Summary: Syrian protesters 'tortured in school cellars as part of mass intimidation campaign'.
(10 May 2011) - Syrian protesters, including women and children, are being tortured in school cellars as part of a mass campaign to crush the spirit of the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad, activists and former captives have claimed. Photographic evidence collected by Western and local rights agencies indicate that children as young as 12 have faced heavy beatings at the hands of Mr Assad's feared secret police, the Mukhabarat. Men and women were said to suffer even more extreme punishment, ranging from electric shocks to the extraction of fingernails. As Syria braces for an eighth consecutive weekly showdown between the security forces and demonstrators after midday prayers on Friday, graphic testimony is slowly emerging of the price paid for challenging Mr Assad's 11 year-rule. Unable to quell the unrest through force alone, despite having killed hundreds of civilians, Syria's security forces have instead resorted to mass intimidation. Over the past week, the number of detentions has soared to more than 500 a day, bringing the total to more than 8,000. With prisons filled to capacity, many of those detained are being transported by bus into schools that have been transformed into makeshift "concentration camps", according to the National Initiative for Change, a newly-formed Syrian opposition coalition. Inmates who have been released in recent days said they were held in locked classrooms where they were so tightly-packed there was only room to stand. Many were taken down to the cellars where the Mukhabarat has set up instruments of torture. "They suspended me in the air from my wrists," one protester said in emailed comments. "They demanded that I confess to working for the Mossad, or for the Saudis or for the Lebanese and when I refused they shocked me with a cable whose wires were sticking out." Some inmates, according to testimonies collected by rights groups, had their finger nails pulled out, their toes smashed with hammers or their tongues squeezed and pulled with pliers. Deprived of water for days at a time, many inmates were allegedly reduced to drinking from lavatory bowls. The vast majority of detainees are usually released within three days, a deliberate tactic, opposition activists say. "They torture them brutally and then release them into the community as messengers of fear," said Ausama Monajed. "But it is not working. It only fuels anger and makes the people more determined. Ban Ki-Moon, the UN secretary general, telephoned Mr Assad yesterday to protest "the possible violation of human rights" in Syria. His call came as the Syrian army announced it was pulling out of Deraa, the southern city that has seen some of the worst bloodshed during a week-long siege where snipers frequently shot at anyone leaving their homes. With more than 100 tanks and armoured vehicles gathering on the outskirts of the coastal town of Banias yesterday, the withdrawal from Deraa appeared only to signal the beginnings of a new military assault rather than any softening by the regime. Deep divisions have opened up in the EU over whether to put President Assad on a sanctions list with Italy, Spain, Greece and Cyprus opposing measures to hit the Syrian dictator with asset freezes and travel bans. According to EU diplomats, the southern European countries, who were also hesitant over action against the Libyan regime, are opposed to placing Assad on the black list because "it will close off the possibility of a negotiated settlement with him". Britain, France, Sweden and Netherlands are fighting to have him put on the list as EU ambassadors meet to thrash out agreement in Brussels on Friday.