Syria captures key military official involved in Sednaya prison abuses

Syrian authorities announced the capture of a senior military official believed to have been involved in abuses at the notorious Sednaya prison in the Damascus countryside.

Mohammed Kanjo Hassan, formerly a general in the Syrian army during the Assad era, was apprehended in the village of Khirbet al-Mazah near Tartus on Friday.

The country's new administration, which took power after the collapse of the Assad government on 8 December, accuses Hassan of committing abuses at the prison facility where tens of thousands of Syrians and other nationals were held.

Former officials at Sednaya are believed to have executed and tortured opponents of the former Syrian leader, Bashar al-Assad, who fled to Moscow in the face of the rebel offensive in early December.

For decades, the exact details and structure of Sednaya prison were unknown. The closest human rights activists could get to it were satellite images on Google Maps.

However, when rebels broke into the prison in early December, they found dozens of men and women trapped in cramped cells, deprived of natural light.

Prisoners were often taken into custody suddenly and arbitrarily, with their families left uninformed about their whereabouts or condition for months or even years.

Many relatives only learned of a detainee's fate when they saw their photo among the "Caesar photos", a collection of over 50,000 images smuggled out of Syria and publicised in January 2014, documenting victims of torture and starvation.

That changed with the collapse of Assad's rule, as Syrians flocked to the prison to definitively determine the fate of their loved ones.

Ahmed al-Sharaa, the transitional leader of Syria, has promised to enforce the rule of law as the country emerges from decades of Assad family rule.

The newly formed Syrian administration, under Sharaa, has also vowed to hold former officials accountable for abuses.

Syria's revolution began in 2011, largely in response to abuses committed under Assad and his father, Hafez.

Upwards of 600,000 people are believed to have died in the consequent civil war, and around six million Syrians fled the country, mostly to Turkey and Europe.