By Maggie Michael
Damascus (Reuters) -“Don’t look forward to her”, the calling WhatsApp informed Abeer Suleiman’s household on May 21, hours after she vanished from the streets of the Syrian metropolis of Safita. “He just isn’t returning.”
The kidnapper of Suleiman and one other man who recognized themselves as an middleman stated in subsequent calls and messages that the 29 -year -old girl would have been killed or busy in slavery except her family members pay them a ransom of $ 15,000.
“I’m not in Syria,” stated Suleiman herself to his household in a name on May 29 from the identical phone quantity utilized by his kidnapper, who had an Iraqi marketing campaign code. “All the accents round me are unusual.”
Reuters examined the decision, that the household recorded, along with a few dozen calls and messages despatched by the kidnapper and the middleman, who had a Syrian cellphone quantity.
Suleiman is amongst no less than 33 ladies and ladies of the Alawite sect of Syria – aged between 16 and 39 years previous – who’ve been kidnapped or disappeared this 12 months in turbulence after the autumn of Bashar al -assad, based on the households of all of them.
The reversal of the president broadly feared in December after 14 years of civil struggle has unleashed a livid recourse towards the Muslim minorities group to which he belongs, with armed factions affiliated to the present authorities that lit the Alawiti civilians of their coastal co -cimes in March, killing tons of of individuals.
Since March, social media have seen a relentless stream of messages and video clips revealed by households of Alawite ladies dispersed that appealed for data on them, with new instances that seem virtually daily, based on a assessment of Reuters that has not discovered on-line experiences of girls of different seven.
The United Nations Investigation Commission on Syria informed Reuters that it’s investigating the disappearance and alleged kidnappings of Alawite ladies following a peak in relations this 12 months. The Commission, established in 2011 to probe the violations of the rights after the outbreak of the civil struggle, will report back to the United Nations Human Rights Council as soon as the investigations ended, stated a spokesperson.
Soleiman’s household borrows from buddies and neighbors to scrape his redemption of $ 15,000, who moved to 3 cash switch accounts to the Turkish metropolis of Izmir on 27 and 28 May in 30 transfers starting from $ 300 to $ 700, a close-by relative informed Reuters, sharing the transactions receipts.
Once all the cash was delivered as instructed, the kidnapper and the middleman ceased all of the contacts, with their telephones off, stated the relative. Suleiman’s household nonetheless has no concept what she has change into.
Detailed interviews with the households of 16 disappeared ladies and ladies have found that they’re believed that seven of them had been kidnapped, with their family members who’ve acquired requests for ransoms starting from $ 1,500 to $ 100,000. Three of the kidnapped – together with Suleiman – despatched textual content messages or voice messages by saying that they’d been introduced in a foreign country.
There was no phrase on the destiny of the opposite 9. Eight of the 16 lacking Alawiti are beneath the age of 18, their households stated.
Reuters examined about 20 textual content messages, calls and movies of the kidnapped and their alleged kidnappers, in addition to the receipts of some redemption transfers, though it was not capable of confirm all of the elements of the accounts of the households or decide who may have focused ladies or their causes.
All 33 ladies have disappeared within the governors of Tartous, Latakia and Hama, who’ve nice populations of Alawite. Almost half of it has returned residence, though all ladies and their households have refused to touch upon the circumstances, with a lot of the security fears.
Most of the households interviewed by Reuters stated they believed that the police didn’t take their instances severely after they reported that their family members are lacking or are kidnapped and that the authorities haven’t investigated.
The Syrian authorities didn’t reply to a remark request for this text.
Ahmed Mohammed Khair, a media officer for the governor of Tartous, rejected any suggestion that the Alawites had been focused and stated that the majority instances of disappeared ladies trusted household disputes or private causes reasonably than relationships, with out presenting proof in help of this.
“Women or are compelled to marry somebody who is not going to need to marry, so that they run away or typically need to entice consideration disappearing”, he added and warned that “unused accusations” may create panic and discord and destabilize security.
A media officer for the Latakia Governorate echoed Khair’s feedback, stating that in lots of instances ladies flee with their lovers and households manufacture tales of kidnapping to keep away from social stigma.
The media officer of the Governorate of Hama refused to remark.
A member of a analysis committee on the information established by the brand new Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa to research the mass killings of the Alawites within the coastal areas in March, refused to touch upon the instances of disappeared ladies.
Al-Sharaa denounced the spreading of sectarian blood as a menace to its mission to unite the devastated nation and promised to punish these accountable, together with these affiliated to the federal government if crucial.
Grabbed as he went to highschool
The Syrian rights lawyer Yamen Hussein, who this 12 months monitored the disappearance of girls, stated that the majority had taken place within the wake of March violence. As far as he knew, solely the Alawites had been focused and the identities and causes of the authors stay unknown, he stated.
He described a widespread feeling of worry among the many Alawites, which adhere to a department of Shiite Islam and symbolize a few tenth of the primarily Sunni inhabitants of Syria.
Some ladies and ladies in sturdy, Latakia and Hama are removed from faculty or faculty as a result of they worry they’re focused, Hussein stated.
“For certain, we have now an actual downside right here during which Alawite ladies are focused with kidnappings,” he added. “Mirare to ladies of the defeated social gathering is a tactic of humiliation that has been used prior to now by the Assad regime”.
Thousands of Alawiti had been compelled by their properties to Damascus, whereas many had been fired from their work and have confronted harassment to the checkpoints of the Sunni fighters affiliated to the federal government.
The interviews with households of disappeared ladies confirmed that the majority of them disappeared in broad daylight, whereas they had been commissions or journey with public transport.
Zeinab Ghadir is among the many youngest.
The seventeen-year-old was kidnapped whereas going to highschool within the metropolis of Latakia of Al-Hanadi on February 27, based on a member of the family who stated that his suspicious kidnapper contacted them with a textual content message to warn them to not publish pictures of the lady on-line.
“I do not need to see a single picture or, I swear on God, I ship you his blood,” the person stated in a textual content message despatched by the lady’s cellphone on the identical day he disappeared.
The teenager made a brief cellphone name at residence, saying that he didn’t know the place he had been taken and that he had a abdomen ache, earlier than the road was lower, he stated his relative. The household has no concept what occurred to her.
Khozama Nayef was torn on March 18 within the Hama rural by a gaggle of 5 males who doped her to make her fall for a number of hours whereas they made her loopy, she informed Reuters a detailed relative, citing the testimony of the 5 -year -old mom when she was returned.
The 35 -year -old spent 15 days in captivity whereas his kidnappers negotiated with the household who ultimately paid $ 1,500 {dollars} to safe his liberation, based on the member of the family who stated that when he returned residence he had a psychological exhaustion.
Days after Nayef was taken, the 29 -year -old Doaa Abbas was kidnapped to his door by a gaggle of attackers who dragged her to a automobile ready outdoors and hastened, based on a member of the family who witnessed the kidnapping within the metropolis of Hama of Salhab.
The relative, who didn’t see what number of males they took Abbas or in the event that they had been armed, stated he tried to comply with his bike however overpassed the automobile.
Three Alawiti reported dispersed by their households on social media this 12 months, which aren’t included within the 33 instances recognized by Reuters, since then they’ve re -emerged and denied public that they’ve been kidnapped.
One of them, a 16 -year -old lady from Latakia, revealed a web-based video saying that she escaped alone to marry a Sunni man. His household contradicted his story, saying to Reuters that he had been kidnapped and compelled to marry the person and that the safety authorities had ordered her to say that she had gladly protected her kidnappers.
Reuters was unable to confirm any of the 2 accounts. A spokesman for the Syrian authorities and the Latakian authorities didn’t reply questions on it.
The different two Alawiti who re -emerged, a 23 -year -old girl and a 12 -year -old lady, informed the Arab tv channels who had traveled with their will to the cities of Aleppo and Damascus, respectively, though the primary stated she had been overwhelmed by a person in an residence earlier than operating away.
Dark recollections of the Islamic State
The Alawiti of Syria dominated the nation’s political and navy elite for many years beneath the Assad dynasty. The sudden launch of Bashar al-Assad in December noticed the rise of a brand new authorities led by HTS, a Sunni group that emerged from a corporation as soon as affiliated to Al Qaeda. The new authorities is striving to combine dozens of former rebellious factions, together with some overseas fighters, in its safety forces to fill a void left after the collapse of Assad’s protection system.
Many households of disappeared ladies stated that they and plenty of others of their group worry a nightmare situation during which Alawites suffered from destinies just like these inflicted on the spiritual minority of Yazidi by the Islamic State a few decade in the past.
IS, a Sunni Jihadist group, compelled 1000’s of Yazidi ladies with sexual slavery throughout a realm of terror that noticed her commanders declare a caliphate that included most of Iraq and Syria, based on the United Nations
A sequence of horrible eventualities are torturing the minds of the Nagham Shadi household, a Alawita girl who disappeared this month, informed Reuters his father.
The 23 -year -old left their residence within the village of Al Bayadiyah in Hama on June 2 to purchase milk and by no means returned, Shadi Aisha stated, describing a distressing look forward to any phrase about his daughter’s destiny.
Aisha stated her household was compelled by their earlier home in a village close to March 7 throughout anti-Alawita violence.
“What can we do? We depart him to God.”
(Report by Maggie Michael; Assembly of Pravin Char)
