Tadmor prison ( ar, سجن تدمر) was located in

Palmyra Palmyra (; Palmyrene: () ''Tadmor''; ar, تَدْمُر ''Tadmur'') is an ancient city in present-day Homs Governorate, Syria. Archaeological finds date back to the Neolithic period, and documents first mention the city in the early second ...

(''Tadmor'' in Arabic) in the deserts of eastern

Syria Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...

approximately 200 kilometers northeast of

Damascus )), is an adjective which means "spacious". , motto = , image_flag = Flag of Damascus.svg , image_seal = Emblem of Damascus.svg , seal_type = Seal , map_caption = , ...

. Tadmor prison was known for harsh conditions, extensive

human rights Human rights are Morality, moral principles or Social norm, normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for ce ...

abuse,

torture Torture is the deliberate infliction of severe pain or suffering on a person for reasons such as punishment, extracting a confession, interrogation for information, or intimidating third parties. Some definitions are restricted to acts c ...

and

summary execution A summary execution is an execution in which a person is accused of a crime and immediately killed without the benefit of a full and fair trial. Executions as the result of summary justice (such as a drumhead court-martial) are sometimes include ...

s. A 2001 report by Amnesty International called it a source of "despair, torture and degrading treatment." It was captured and destroyed by militants of the

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant An Islamic state is a State (polity), state that has a form of government based on sharia, Islamic law (sharia). As a term, it has been used to describe various historical Polity, polities and theories of governance in the Islamic world. As a t ...

(ISIL) in May 2015.

History

Founding

The structures were originally built as military barracks by the

French Mandate The Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon (french: Mandat pour la Syrie et le Liban; ar, الانتداب الفرنسي على سوريا ولبنان, al-intidāb al-fransi 'ala suriya wa-lubnān) (1923−1946) was a League of Nations mandate foun ...

forces.

Prison massacre

During the 1980s, Tadmor prison housed thousands of Syrian prisoners, both political and criminal and it was also the scene of the June 27, 1980 ''Tadmor Prison massacre'' of prisoners by

Rifaat al-Assad Rifaat Ali al-Assad ( ar, رِفْعَتُ عَلِيِّ ٱلْأَسَدِ, Rifʿat al-ʾAsad; born 22 August 1937) is the younger brother of the late President of Syria, Hafez Assad, and Jamil al-Assad, and the uncle of the incumbent President ...

, the day after the Syrian branch of the Islamist

Muslim Brotherhood The Society of the Muslim Brothers ( ar, جماعة الإخوان المسلمين'' ''), better known as the Muslim Brotherhood ( ', is a transnational Sunni Islamist organization founded in Egypt by Islamic scholar and schoolteacher Hassan ...

narrowly failed in an attempt to assassinate his brother,

president President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) *President (education), a leader of a college or university *President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ful ...

Hafez al-Assad Hafez al-Assad ', , (, 6 October 1930 – 10 June 2000) was a Syrian statesman and military officer who served as President of Syria from taking power in 1971 until his death in 2000. He was also Prime Minister of Syria from 1970 to 1 ...

. Members of units of the

Defence Brigades The Defense Companies ( ar, سرايا الدفاع; ) were a paramilitary force in Syria that were commanded by Rifaat al-Assad. Their task was to defend the Assad government, and Damascus, from internal and external attack. In 1984 the 55,000 st ...

, under the command of Rifaat al-Assad, entered Tadmor Prison at dawn and murdered an estimated thousand prisoners in the cells and the dormitories. Kerry Pither. "Dark Days: The Story of Four Canadians Tortured in the Name of Fighting Terror", 2008. The massacre is well known throughout Syria.

Closure and reopening

Tadmor prison was closed in 2001 and all remaining detainees were transferred to other prisons in Syria. Tadmor Prison was reopened on June 15, 2011, and 350 individuals arrested for participation in anti-government demonstrations were transferred there for interrogation and detainment.

Destruction

In May 2015, Tadmur was captured by the

who also took over the prison and released a video of its interior.Islamic State gives tour of captured jail where Assad's men tortured prisoners
/ref> ISIL militants used explosives to blow up the prison complex on 30 May.

References

External links

A 1996 Human Rights Watch report on Tadmor prison
* Defunct prisons in Syria Torture in Syria Buildings and structures in Homs Governorate Palmyra Buildings and structures demolished in 2015 Buildings and structures destroyed by ISIL 2015 in the Syrian civil war {{prison-stub