None of us are free until we are all free.
We are survivors of detention, families of Syria’s disappeared and human rights activists who are working together to build a formidable global movement demanding freedom and safety for all Syria’s detainees and forcibly disappeared.
We advocate, run campaigns, and build awareness about the ongoing crime of detention in Syria and the very real risk of disappearance at the hands of the Syrian regime and other groups.
We are calling for:
The release of all those arbitrarily detained or disappeared, all those who are still held in Assad’s detention centres. We are calling for a recognition of the continued harm that their detention has on their families.
Public Prosecutors across Europe, the US and elsewhere to open investigations into crimes against humanity in Syria including detention, torture and sexual abuse.
International support for the international mechanism for missing persons in Syria, including from governmental bodies, UN officials and civil society.
Legal support to former detainees who want to file cases against their perpetrators, when possible.
An independent body to document detention and enforced disappearance without increasing risk to those still detained and their families.
Instead of renewing diplomatic relations with the Syrian regime, world leaders should be seeking justice and accountability for its crimes.
The Coalition
Action For Sama was launched by Waad and Hamza al-Kateab after the incredible worldwide reaction to their BAFTA-winning and Oscar-nominated documentary film, FOR SAMA.
The Action For Sama campaign is run by a team of Syrian and campaign specialists, who believe in human rights, human dignity, and accountability. Alongside partners and allies, and embedded within public engagement, AFS focuses on two key themes within the documentary, Accountability for the attacks on healthcare facilities in Syria and Building understanding and empathy towards the Syrian Refugee Crisis.
Families for Freedom is the first movement that is led by families of the detainees and forcibly disappeared in Syria. Since it was founded, the movement has worked on community organisation, legal awareness and psychosocial support. It has also worked in connection with victims groups of arbitrary detention and forced disappearance to form a truth and justice charter to demand the immediate release of detainees, reveal the fate and whereabouts of the missing and forcibly disappeared and achieve transitional justice. One of its top demands is to establish an international humanitarian mechanism to release the detainees and reveal the fate of the missing.
Wafa Ali Mustafa is a Syrian activist, journalist, and a survivor from detention. She left the country on 9 July 2013, exactly a week after her father was forcibly disappeared by the regime in Damascus. She fled to Turkey and began reporting on Syria for various media outlets. In 2016, she moved to Germany and continued her interrupted studies and graduated from Bard College Berlin. Mustafa has extensively lobbied the United Nations Security Council to call for the release of the names and the whereabouts of all the disappeared by the Syrian regime and other actors in the country. In her advocacy, Mustafa covers the impact of detention on young girls and women and families. Mustafa also campaigns for international recognition of Syrian refugees and against normalized international relations with the Assad regime.
We are a group of families that have lost loved ones under torture, our loved ones became the victims of forced disappearance in the Syrian regime’s prisons. We identified our relatives in the Ceasar photos which were leaked from the Syrian regime detention centers. We’ve been working together since February 2018 in Berlin to establish the Caesars Families Association (CFA). CFA aims to unify our voices, demanding truth, justice, and restitution for the victims of torture and forced disappearance in Syria.
Hala Subhi is a Syrian activist who took part in the nonviolent uprising in Aleppo, Syria in 2011. In 2013 after having to flee her home because of the conflict, her brother has been forcibly disappeared, and she and her family know nothing about his whereabouts since then. Nothing stopped Hala's fights for human rights; she became focused on health as a right for all, eventually, she was awarded a scholarship to study Global Health at UCL. She is also interested in detention and forced disappearance as a public and global health matter. She tries through her work to advocate for the right of detainees and their families to normal lives and good mental and physical health, a thing that the continuation of detention practices would never allow.
Ta’afi is a Syrian survivors’ led, survivors’ centered initiative that aims to support and protect victims of detention, torture, and enforced disappearance upon their release and settlement at a secure location, so that they may continue to peacefully support human rights change in Syria and pursue justice and accountability.