To mark the International Day of the Disappeared, Syrian families placed hundreds of phones in Berlin to demonstrate the scale of their suffering as they wait for answers, “willing the phone to ring with any news at all”
Imagine waiting for years for a phone call. This weekend Syrian families placed hundreds of telephones across a square in Berlin to demonstrate the scale of their suffering as they wait for answers, “willing the phone to ring with any news at all” about the fate of their forcibly disappeared loved ones.
Enforced disappearance is used as a control tactic to spread terror within Syrian society and to suppress dissent. Tens of thousands of people have been forcibly disappeared, the majority at the hands of the Syrian regime but other armed groups have also used the practice as a weapon of war. Many of their families have no idea where they are being held or whether they’re alive or dead.
Lamis al-Khateeb of Families for Freedom holding a photo of her husband Niraz Saied
To mark International Day of the Disappeared today, please share a photo of their demonstration to help build urgent pressure on the international community to take urgent steps to uncover the fate of Syria’s disappeared and give answers to their families, end impunity for these crimes, and hold perpetrators accountable.
Yasmin Meshaan, Caesar Families Association
Amina Kholani, Families for Freedom
Diab Serrih, Association of Detainees and The Missing in Sednaya Prison
Sedra Shehabi, Families for Freedom
The protest was organised alongside groups representing the families and survivors of detention in Syria – Families for Freedom, Caesar Families Association, The Association of Detainees and The Missing in Sednaya Prison, Massar and Ta’afi.