This report highlights the practice of enforced disappearances of hundreds of people in Deir Ezzor governorate. The report seeks to answer questions about those involved in enforced disappearances, the efforts of the relatives of those who forcibly disappeared to know their children’s fate, and the challenges they face. This report concludes with many findings related to the enforced disappearance in Deir Ezzor, including the presence of the so-called “brokers”, who are a group of people playing the intermediary role between the families of the disappeared and security officials from different conflict parties in exchange of tremendous amounts of money, that does not often lead to knowing the fate of the forcibly disappeared.
The report highlighted two main themes: The first is the most likely responsible parties for the enforced disappearances in Deir Ezzor, and the second is the efforts of the families of those forcibly disappeared to know the fate of their children.
JFL recommends that it is necessary to establish a mechanism to search and know the fate of the missing and forcibly disappeared people, likewise many international bodies , and emphasizes the need to, when forming this mechanism, engage parties who have access to detention centers and can overcome restrictions that prevented the International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism (IIIM) and the Commission of Inquiry (COI) from entering Syria and fulfilling their duties.
This recommendation also comes in the context of the UN General Assembly’s call for the Secretary-General to strengthen efforts to reveal the fates and locations of missing people in Syria .
Read more: “Even a Piece of Information, that is all I Demand”
