Key suspect in notorious Tadamon massacre during Syria civil war arrested

Amjad Youssef was wanted over the mass killing of blindfolded civilians in April 2013 in the district of Damascus. Tadamon: Key suspect in notorious Syrian civil war massacre arrested Copyright current_year BBC. All rights reserved. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read about our approach to external linking. Copyright current_year BBC. All rights reserved. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read about our approach to external linking. Victims were bound and blindfolded before being dumped in a pit in Tadamon A woman holds her hand to her face in grief in the district of Tadamon in Damascus (file photo) Key suspect in notorious Tadamon massacre during Syria civil war arrested A key suspect in one of the most notorious killings of the Syrian civil war has been arrested, Syria's interior minister has said. Amjad Youssef was wanted over the mass killing of civilians in April 2013 in the Tadamon district of Damascus. Footage emerged in 2022 showing Syrian soldiers leading victims, bound and blindfolded, to a pit before shooting them. The video became one of the most direct pieces of visual evidence of extrajudicial killings by then government forces. Interior Minister Anas Khattab said Youssef was the main perpetrator of the massacre and was taken into custody after a "well-executed" security operation. Syria's state news agency said he was detained in Hama province. Footage published by the UK-based monitoring group the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) appeared to show Youssef after his arrest, sitting in a police car, his nose and forehead bloodied. The killings at Tadamon attracted widespread attention after video, filmed by the perpetrators, showing it taking place was leaked nine years later. In the film, victims are seen being led one by one to the pit and shot. It was one of several mass killings in Tadamon by government forces around that time. A woman in Damascus holds up her phone showing a photo of the relative she's looking for After 50 years of Assad cruelty, Syrians search for dead loved ones - and closure Close up side view of the face of Samira, a Syrian mother. She is wearing a black veil and only her eyes are visiblees are I hope Assad pays the price, says mother whose son's death inflamed 2011 Syrian revolution Human Rights Watch (HRW), which has visited the site, said there was evidence that 288 were killed in Tadamon, 41 in the incident in April 2013. It said 11 blindfolded victims shown in the video were shot at close range and pushed into a machine-dug grave. It has called the area "a huge crime scene". HRW senior researcher Hiba Zayadin said the leaked video "filmed by the perpetrators themselves who laughed as they killed their victims, shows the [former] Syrian government's callous disregard for people's lives. "This massacre is just one horrific incident in a pattern of state violence and apparent war crimes." The government at the time, led by President Bashar al-Assad, was toppled by rebels in December 2024. Assad's forces had fought jihadist and rebel groups in the civil war which began in March 2011 when security forces cracked down violently on peaceful pro-democracy protests. The government at the time, led by President Bashar al-Assad, . Assad's forces had fought jihadist and rebel groups in the civil war which began in March 2011 when security forces cracked down violently on peaceful pro-democracy protests. More than half a million people were killed in over 13 years of conflict which followed. The US and Iran's rival blockades of the Strait of Hormuz have become a "test of wills", says Lyse Doucet. A 10-day truce between the two countries has been extended by three weeks after talks in Washington. Envoys from the two countries met in Washington as the fragile truce was due to expire on Sunday. Eyewitnesses captured the moment a burning fuel tanker drove through the centre of Hasakah, Syria, leaving a trail of fire behind it. The French company paid $6.5m to jihadist groups to keep its plant running in war-torn Syria, a Paris court heard. Merz’s government has taken a tougher line on refugees and migrants, amid surging support for the anti-immigration AfD party. Europol said more than 450 officers from the UK, Germany and Belgium were involved in the operation. Syria condemned the strikes on weapons sites and government infrastructure as an "outrageous" assault on Syria's sovereignty.