The general coordinator of Weam Project in Raqqa governorate and former director of the Syrian Arab Red Crescent’s Raqqa governorate branch, named as Majed Ismail al Tern, and his brother Fawaz, a pharmacist, who are both from Raqqa city, were arrested by Syrian Democratic Forces ON February 22, 2021, during a raid on their homes in al Wadi Street in Raqqa city. At the same day, the forces arrested ten other members from their family, including a woman, in Bayyoud village in northwestern of Raqqa governorate, with all the detained family members taken to an undisclosed location. The arrests were accompanied by ransacking and looting of the family members’ homes.
We note that no members of the detainees’ families have been informed of their arrests or whereabouts, with the phones of the detained civilians being confiscated, preventing them from contacting their families. SNHR fears that they will be subjected to torture and ultimately classified as forcibly ‘disappeared’, like approximately 85 percent of all detained persons in Syria.
SNHR notes that about 3,398 Syrian citizens are still detained or forcibly disappeared in the SDF’s detention centers, constituting a grave threat to their wellbeing given the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic.
