#enforced-disappearance

#enforced-disappearance

This psychological limbo was highlighted this week by the case of Hamza Adwan, a 67-year-old detainee whose family was informed of his death on Sunday four months after he actually died in custody on September 9, 2025. Adwan, a father of nine who had already lost two sons before the war, was arrested at a checkpoint on November 12, 2024. According to his family, he was detained despite suffering from serious health issues, including heart disease, and requiring constant medical care.

When the al-Assad regime falls, Ammar, a Syrian lawyer and former Sednaya prison detainee, is determined to uncover the truth about Syria's missing. Haunted by the disappeared and his own imprisonment, he searches for answers in the ruins of Sednaya prison. Among classified documents, he discovers records of enforced disappearances and deaths, exposing the regime's brutality. With each case, Ammar pursues justice and closure, offering families a chance to grieve and heal.

For more than 11 years, I told myself it was too early to grieve. My father, Ali Mustafa, was arrested by Bashar al-Assad's forces in Syria on 2 July 2013 and disappeared. Since that day, we have had no word, no trace, nothing. Every morning since he was taken I made my first thought after waking up: He is alive. Every night I went to sleep repeating it.