An opposition group reports that Syrian government jailers executed 131 inmates in Damascus prison who had contracted the plague
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Syrian President Bashar al-Assad Photo: JOSEPH EID/AFP
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Syrian government jailers have executed 131 inmates in a Damascus prison who
had contracted the plague, it was reported on Thursday.
Conditions in the 215 Security Branch detention centre in the Syrian capital
were so dire that pulmonary plague was spreading through the detainees. In
September of this year, the officer in charge of the prison ordered the
executions of inmates in dormitory number eight, according to an opposition
group called the Syrian
Association, which documents human rights violations.
Up to 117 people were killed in the first round of mass killings, with a
further 14 killed two days later, the group said.
The bodies were then reportedly wrapped in nylon bags before being transferred
to a mass grave near a military housing complex nearby.
Human Rights Watch said it did not have proof of this massacre, but that other
deaths in this detention facility have been well documented, including
reports from former detainees reflecting mass killings.
