NGO denounces human rights violations against repatriated Syrian refugees

The Access Center for Human Rights (ACHR) an NGO dedicated to human rights advocacy, released a report on Friday detailing its findings on four cases of human rights violations against Syrian refugees who were recently voluntarily repatriated, highlighting, it warned, "that Syria is still not safe."

Having followed four cases of Syrians who had recently returned to their country after the fall of the Assad regime in December 2024, ACHR found that some had been killed and others had died in detention and were later found with signs of torture. Others still were victims of enforced disappearances or arbitrarily detained upon their return to Syria, with no further contact with their families, the report explains.

The NGO also highlighted various other risks and dangers that "continue to shape the country's security landscape," even after the Assad family's removal from power. These security threats have a "profound impact on the daily lives of Syrians," the report reads, and "influence how refugees assess their willingness to return to their country."

Included in the report are the massacres and sectarian violence that has broken out since December, specifically targeting Alawites and Druze. These episodes of bloody violence have marked a fragile transition period in which the new authorities' most urgent and challenging task has been to establish security in the country.

In the largely Alawite region along the Syrian coast, about 1,700 people were killed in sectarian violence last March, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR). Fighting between Druze and Bedouin tribes also spread in July in Sweida and was compounded by attempts from state security forces who intervened in the fighting but ended up locked in battle with Druze fighters themselves. These clashes resulted in more than 1,400 deaths, according to SOHR.

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Since December 2024, Syrians have been "optimistic" about their return to the country, but many remain "concerned about the prevailing uncertainty, especially regarding security," the report notes, citing a study of a sample of 214 refugees in Lebanon.

The document "clarifies the return intentions of Syrian refugees in Lebanon, indicating that only 12 percent of respondents planned to return to Syria and 50 percent said they did not wish to return."

The NGO also cites another study on intentions to return conducted by the International Rescue Committee (IRC) among more than 3,000 Syrian households (representing more than 17,000 Syrian refugees in Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey), which reached similar conclusions. According to that study, 29 percent currently intend to return to their country and the majority remain undecided (37 percent) or have no intention to return at all (34 percent).

The report concludes with a quote from the United Nations Deputy Special Representative, Najat Rochdi: "The risks of a renewed escalation in the region are not hypothetical; they are immediate, serious, and risk undermining fragile progress toward peace and reconstruction in Syria."