Victim of Assad

43 years in prison: Syrian pilot now free

Ragheed Ahmad al-Tatari was imprisoned for 43 years.

(Bild: Waill al-Tatari/The Syria Campaign)

After the end of Bashar al-Assad's reign of terror, the revolutionaries have also opened the prison gates in Syria. Now the incomprehensible is coming to light: murder, torture and extermination took place in the dungeons for decades. Ragheed al-Tatari is among those freed. The former pilot spent 43 years in various prisons for refusing to bomb people.

According to the human rights organization "The Syria Campaign", Ragheed al-Tatari is the longest-held political prisoner in Syria. He was locked up during the regime of Assad's father, Hafez al-Assad, in the early 1980s without ever being given a proper protest.

After 43 years in various prisons and torture dungeons, he was released from the central prison in Damascus on Sunday.

Ragheed Ahmad al-Tatari was imprisoned for 43 years.

(Bild: Waill al-Tatari/The Syria Campaign)

Arrested at the age of 27
Al-Tatari was first arrested in 1980 because, as a 27-year-old Syrian Air Force pilot, he refused to obey orders to bomb insurgent positions against the Assad regime in the city of Hama. At the time, Assad's father - like his son after him - took extremely harsh action against rebels and civilians, resulting in numerous massacres.

After a temporary, brief release, Ragheed al-Tatari had to return behind bars in 1981 and remained imprisoned until last Sunday. He initially spent two years in solitary confinement in Mezzeh prison, was then transferred to a notorious dungeon in Palmyra, from 2000 he was imprisoned in Sednaya and in 2011 he was transferred to Adra Central Prison, where he remained until his release.

Even children freed from "slaughterhouse"
Cruel conditions prevailed in Syria's prisons. Torture was the order of the day and thousands of people were executed. One of the worst dungeons was the Saidnaya military prison north of Damascus, also known as "Assad's slaughterhouse". According to the rebels, hundreds of prisoners, including children, were freed from underground chambers there.

In recent days, dogs and sound sensors have been used to search for further secret cells in the basement. Apparently no further victims were found. Before that, however, terrible things were discovered. "There were bodies in the ovens. It was absurd what we witnessed and this behavior is against humanity," a witness told the news channel Al Jazeera. It is estimated that up to 50,000 detainees have now been released.

A satellite image of Assad's "slaughterhouse" in Saidnaya

(Bild: Wikimedia Commons/99snake)

Assad fled to Russia after overthrow
According to Russian state media, Assad fled to Russia after his overthrow. The fighters had launched a surprise offensive in north-western Syria on November 27 and had advanced as far as the capital within a few days. The Islamists announced that "all those unjustly imprisoned" would be released.