RIP Khaled Bakrawi

Khaled Bakrawi was a 24-year old activist from Yarmouk Camp, born and raised in Syria but originally from Lubya, Palestine that was ethnically cleansed in 1948. Khaled Bakrawi played an integral role in rallying the masses in the struggle for justice. He was one of the founders of the Jafra Foundation and was extremely active in the Palestinian Youth Movement. During the commemoration of al-Naksa in 2011, Khaled was injured when Israeli Occupation Forces opened fire on the protestors. Despite his wounds, he remained steadfast in his struggles and organized for the internally displaced that made their way into Yarmouk. Khaled Bakrawi had been missing, thought to be in Assad’s jails, since January 19, 2013. This was confirmed on September 11, 2013 when news arose that he had been tortured to death.

Evidence of torture and execution of Syrians (GRAPHIC IMAGES!)

Three lawyers (Sir Desmond de Silva QC , Professor David M. Crane & Professor Sir Geoffrey Nice QC), wrote a report into the credibility of certain evidence in regards to torture and execution of citizens incarcerated by the Syrian regime.  Both the Guardian and CNN wrote articles publishing the report alongside key findings and images.

The following images are from the report which were leaked by a source named "Caesar" who worked in the military police in Syria for 13 years before defecting. The images were taken either by himself or his colleagues in his unit.

"Each body in the photographs seen by CNN had a number written on it; a person's hand can often also be seen holding a piece of paper in the frame of the photograph with the same number written on it."

The following text taken from the report details the process and the reasoning behind the photographs:

The procedure was that when detainees were killed at their places of detention their bodies would be taken to a military hospital to which he would be sent with a doctor and a member of the judiciary, “Caesar’s” function being to photograph the corpses. He informed the inquiry team that there could be as many as fifty (50) bodies a day to photograph which required fifteen to thirty minutes of work per corpse. The purpose of documenting the corpses was to ensure that none had been released by the security services and to inform the families of murdered detainees in due course that the cause of death in each case was either a “heart attack” or “breathing problems” and to satisfy the authorities that executions had been performed. Each murdered detainee was given two numbers with only the intelligence service knowing the identities of the corpses. The procedure for documentation was that when a detainee was killed each body was given a reference number which related to that branch of the security service responsible for his detention and death. When the corpse was taken to the military hospital it was given a further number so as to document, falsely, that death had occurred in the hospital. Once the bodies were photographed they were taken for burial in a rural area.