This Video Does Not Depict a Prisoner at Sednaya Prison

Misbar investigated the viral video and found it to be misleading.

After an investigation, the video was found to predate the liberation of Sednaya Prison prisoners. It was first uploaded to the internet on September 27, while the liberation of prisoners occurred on December 8.

The Liberation of Prisoners From Sednaya Prison

After entering the capital of Syria and forcing Bashar al-Assad to flee, opposition groups entered Sednaya Prison, near Damascus, on Sunday, 8 December 2024.

Thousands of people, mainly opponents of the Assad regime, were liberated. On the same day, the Syrian civil defense group "White Helmets" said on X that it had deployed five specialized emergency teams to investigate hidden underground cells, which, according to survivors, might still be holding detainees.

What Is Sednaya Prison?

In 2017, Amnesty International described Sednaya Prison as a "human slaughterhouse," denouncing "murder, torture, enforced disappearance, and extermination" carried out by Syrian authorities since the start of the Syrian civil war in 2011.

Search Operation for Remaining Syrian Detainees

On December 9, the "White Helmets" released an official statement saying their search "did not uncover any unopened or hidden areas within the facility." Given that there are still people missing, the organization asserted its full availability to assist in investigating locations suspected of containing hidden detainees.

The Association of Detainees and the Missing in Sednaya Prison confirmed this, stating, "There is no truth to the presence of detainees trapped underground" and that the last prisoner was released on December 8 at 11 a.m. (Damascus time).

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