How did the Assad regime buried its victims in a mass grave in Syria

The Najha Cemetery is about five miles south of Damascus, the capital. It was established decades ago as a modest burial land for people from Damascus and the neighboring towns.

Soon after the campaign on The Syrian Revolution in March 2011The government of President Bashar al-Assad began using the cemetery to bury the people who were killed-many after they were Prisons. Among the victims of the regime were the anti -government demonstrators, activists and journalists; The loyalists who fell unbeatable; And members of the rebel factions.

Satellite image from November 2011 by Maxar Technologies

New York Times

While the presence of mass graves in Naja was previously known, our achievement reveals – for the first time – how the regime systematically developed the cemetery to one of the largest collective graves sites in the country.

Mr. Assad’s intelligence forces initially used the existing existing graves that have not yet been taken for civil burial, and then began to throw bodies brilliantly drilling. In recent years, long trenches were full of bodies, section after another.

The Times visited its survivor cemetery in February, two months after the rebels The overthrow of the government of Mr. Assad.

Times journalists also analyzed satellite images from 2011 to 2024, reviewed the photos and videos, and conducted interviews with more than 20 people – including neighbors and former workers who were forced to participate in the collective burial in Najha. Their accounts agree with each other and what Preamble rights Collections I reported Naja and other group graves.

There are now wide efforts to determine and determine the location of what is believed to be dozens of mass graves throughout the country. It was its survivor It was identified by The Assad government collapsed. At least 60 sites have been informed of the white helmets, a Syrian civil defense group leading an attempt to dig graves.

The Assad government has repeatedly denied the killing of people in detention, but this practice was Widely documented. The exact number of bodies in the mass graves – including Najha – cannot be known until the excavations are completed. The Syrian Network for Human Rights appreciate that More than 160,000 people Those who have been detained in regime detention centers are still missing.

The families of the missing prisoners in Margah Square in Damascus looked at the stickers that separate information about their relatives.

Nicole Tong for the New York Times

“The mass graves that we have seen so far are greater than anything we have faced,” said Catherine Boomberger of “The mass graves that we have seen so far. International Committee for missing persons.

The bodies were initially stacked in the existing graves

2011 – 12

The Assad government began to bury the bodies of the detainees in its survivors in mid -2011, according to the former workers.

Early block burials used sites that aim for people to bury their loved ones – rows of pre -graves, several feet underground.

But the former workers succeeded in the regime officers buried multiple bodies in one grave. Using existing sites, the system enables the main burial to be more confidential.

At that time, Mohamed Evevef Nayevier said that a writer in the local sex office-his manager was first commanded to accompany intelligence officials to Naja in mid-2011. There, they saw them open an unique grave and throw from six to seven bodies inside. He said that the same process was repeated at least twice in 2011, with the number of bodies increased each time.

“There were so many decomposing bodies that they started getting out of the truck,” said Mr. Naifier, who eventually had to manage some aspects of burials. He said that the bodies that have not already been degraded have signs of torture.

The satellite images that were analyzed by confirmed signs of collective grave activity – Earth’s disorders, large compounds, extensive digging and drilling – in the area described by Mr. Naifier.

The bodies came to Naja and other mass graves near torture prisons like Sidnaya Military hospitals such as Tishreen and HARASTA, according to reports of human right groups, including The Association of the detainees and the missing persons in Sidnaya Prison.

The Times spoke to a former driver of the Assad government, who said he had transferred trucks from the bodies from Harasta Military Hospital to mass graves and witnessed buried in its survivors.

“I thought about leaving, but that would have endangered my family,” said the driver, who spoke to the Times on the condition of his identity not to be disclosed. He added: “Every driver had a truck to follow orders,” because the Assad government was “unforgiving.”

With the high killings, the bodies were thrown into deep pits

2012

By 2012, a year after the civil war, deaths began under the Assad regime to rise. With the killing of more detainees, the government has increased the mass burial process in a success.

Instead of using the current graves, the intelligence forces for local municipal workers for drilling, and depth of about 10 feet. Among them was Ragheb Turki Mihzah and Yousef Ubayd, who led heavy machines at the time to Damascus Governorate.

They said that intelligence officers directed the workers to fill the pits with hundreds of bodies that arrived in a 50 -foot refrigerated trucks are usually used to transport products.

In the area where Mr. Miszah and Mr. Obid said they dug with bulldozers, the Times found evidence of deep pits. The dimensions of many pits that match the description of Mr. Mishah.

The burial took place in the early morning and at night, according to the former graves workers. Government forces will wipe anyone in the area and guard the entrance. The officials were confiscating the phones of workers the grave and threatening to implement them if they refused to do so, he said.

Mr. Mihzah, 47, said that while the bodies were overflowing from a hole, one of the officers once told the bulldozer, “Pay them down, or I will put you with them.”

Iman Muhammad Khalil, a goalkeeper in her survivor, who was used by civilians, said that he sometimes noticed signs of fresh dirt that was delivered in the morning – a sign of the last drilling. He was not allowed to be near mass graves when government forces were there.

“They are afraid to come here,” said Mr. Khalil, who has worked in her survivor nearly two decades ago and believes that it may be buried there. “They will take away anyone standing here.”

Mr. Khalil walked on the one hand, who said witnesses that he said was used in collective burial.

For the New York Times

The residents who lived next to the Times succeeded that they were aware of the collective burial, but they remained silent for more than a decade, for fear of revenge.

Al -Falah Al -Zaal, 52, who had a direct vision of the graves of his home, said more than dozens of relatives in the Assad regime, who believed that he may be buried in its survivor.

Mr. Al -Zaal at his window, as he could see the collective graves in the cemetery of its survivor.

Diego Ebara Sanchez for the New York Times

He never uttered a word about what he saw. “Fear is like when you are about to die,” he said.

In recent years, the bodies have been ignored in long trenches

2018 – 24

The group graves activity in Najha slowed down for a period of 2013 because the rebels in the area made it difficult to bury.

With the limited access to Najha, the government in that year transferred the operations to another large Group tomb site in poleA town about 20 miles to the north of Damascus. Mr. Mihzah, who worked on both signatories, said that in Qafifa, he and others dug long and tight trenches.

The government regained control of the area near its survivor cemetery in 2014. The Times was unable to verify the activity in its survivors in satellite images until after years, but the residents said they saw trucks reaching the cemetery at the time.

“I felt terrified,” said Muhammad Ali Al -Sala, 48, a farmer at first and returned to his home near its survivor in 2014.

Starting in 2018, long trenches, similar to those in Qutayfa, began to appear in the satellite images analyzed by the Times. The trenches were much longer than the dug brilliantly from years ago. The process in Najha has become more systematic.

The trenches seemed ready months before using them. Diggers tunnel for up to hundreds of feet, so that you do not have to return several times.

The Times could not meet anyone who worked directly on the trenches in Naja. But a long -time goalkeeper, Abdel Aziz, who is known by his title Abu Jihad, said that he witnessed small and large trucks reaching the cemetery from 2018 to 2020.

Yunus Adnan, the farmer who lived next to the cemetery, said that he saw for the first time excavators and trucks reaching its survivors in 2011 and he still saw it recently in 2024.

“From time to time, we saw an excavator coming from afar – we did not dare the approach,” said Mr. Adnan, who believes that his brother is buried in a mass grave. “But when the fossil appeared, we knew something abnormal.”

The wall separates the local community from the collective graves.

Diego Ebara Sanchez for the New York Times