The Syrian Future Movement, which emerged from the just aspirations of the Syrian revolution and paid a heavy price in the blood and sacrifices of its sons for freedom, believes that turning the page on tyranny and the fall of the Assad regime does not mean closing the files on grave human rights violations. Rather, the Syrian Future Movement believes that uncovering the fate of hundreds of thousands of disappeared persons is the true test and the cornerstone for building a new Syria and achieving sustainable civil peace during this critical transitional phase.
In this context, the Syrian Future Movement commemorates today, Sunday, August 30, 2026, the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances. This international occasion was established by the United Nations General Assembly in its resolution 65/209 to reaffirm the inalienable human and legal right to truth, justice, and accountability for crimes against humanity.
The Syrian Future Movement, based on documented statistical reports from human rights and international networks, expresses its deep concern over the scale of the humanitarian catastrophe left by the past era. Statistics indicate that Syria has the highest rate of enforced disappearances globally, with more than 112,000 people forcibly disappeared. The former regime bears direct responsibility for the disappearance of 85% of these individuals, who were held in its torture chambers and secret detention centers.
The Syrian Future Movement believes that the Syrian judiciary’s announcement of judicial rulings against the head of the former regime and his security apparatus during this transitional phase is an important symbolic step, but it remains incomplete unless it is followed by the disclosure of the fate of other missing and disappeared persons.
Based on its national vision committed to the principles of transitional justice, and in line with the circumstances and developments of the current transitional phase, the Syrian Future Movement emphasizes the following recommendations and future positions:
- The Syrian Future Movement calls on the current transitional authorities and newly established national institutions (such as the National Committee for the Missing and the National Committee for Transitional Justice) to expedite the pace of the investigation process, immediately begin opening all discovered mass graves, and utilize modern international DNA matching technologies to provide reassurance to the thousands of families awaiting their fate.
- The Syrian Future Movement acknowledges that the success of the transitional process in Syria hinges on the transparency of the current security and internal agencies in disclosing the secret archives and official documents of the former Assad regime’s intelligence apparatus. It considers the withholding of this information or any delay in its disclosure to be an impediment to the national justice process.
- The Syrian Future Movement calls on the transitional government to immediately and fully ratify the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance and to include in the anticipated permanent Syrian constitution strict articles criminalizing arbitrary arrest outside the framework of the law and political disappearance, classifying them as crimes against humanity that are not subject to any statute of limitations.
- The Syrian Future Movement emphasizes the necessity of continuing and expanding cooperation with the International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism (IIIM) and the UN Institution on Missing Persons, and facilitating their investigative work throughout Syrian territory, to ensure the prosecution of all perpetrators who have fled the country and to uphold the rights of victims in international forums.
- The Syrian Future Movement calls for the launch of comprehensive and urgent national programs to provide material and moral compensation and redress to the families of victims of enforced disappearance. The Movement believes that caring for the wives and children of the missing and empowering them legally and economically is a sovereign duty of the new Syrian state, not a favor from any party.
Today, the Syrian Future Movement stands in reverence and solidarity with the “Caesar Families Association” and all associations of Syrian victims, and pledges to them that the fall of the tyrant and his regime was only the first step; and that the real struggle continues until the fate of the last disappeared person is known, and full justice is achieved on the soil of free Syria.
