هذا التقرير متاح أيضًا بـ العربية
The fall of the Assad regime was followed by the dismantling of its security and military institutions, opening the door to reshaping state institutions and agencies. But does change at the level of power and structures necessarily mean an immediate change in how institutions operate or in the methods of التعامل that have become entrenched within them over decades?
Some police stations and detention centers during this period witnessed practices that sparked criticism and concern over the continuation of methods associated with the Assad regime, as some detention cases ended in the deaths of detainees, according to documentation by rights groups and media outlets.
From this point, this report examines whether the process of change that followed Assad’s fall has truly reached the structure of institutions and their operating mechanisms, what has changed in the performance of employees and personnel, and what forms of practice shaped under Assad’s rule remain present, in order to see how this change has been reflected in institutional performance and in the way their staff deal with citizens.
Testing practice
After Assad’s fall, the Interior Ministry began rebuilding its structures by reorganizing its security apparatuses, merging the police and General Security services under the “Internal Security Command” in the provinces, and establishing departments to receive citizens’ complaints and follow up on disciplinary violations, alongside creating a General Administration for Prisons and Reformatories. Yet this change overlooked the most important question about daily practice: How do personnel exercise their powers? And what mechanisms regulate their work and hold them accountable when abuses occur? It is precisely in these places — inside police stations and police departments — that the real test of change becomes visible and whether citizens can actually feel it.
During this period, places of detention saw cases in which detainees died; some occurred inside detention centers, while others happened after their release. These cases prompted accusations of mistreatment or the use of violence during detention and interrogation, including the death of Youssef al-Labbad after his detention in Damascus in 2025, Abdul Rahman Jaajoul inside the al-Kallaseh police station in Aleppo in the same year, and Mohammed Ghamira in the al-Haffah police department in 2026. Official and family accounts differed over the circumstances of these incidents. These cases revealed one aspect of the test facing security institutions in moving from changing administrative structures to changing daily practice. They also raised questions about the Interior Ministry’s role in regulating the conduct of its personnel, how complaints are handled inside police stations, and the course of investigation and accountability when violations occur.
يوسف لباد لاجئ سوري في ألمانيا عاد إلى بلده وبعد أيام فقط لقي مصرعه.. مطالبات سورية للكشف عن ملابسات مقتله على يد الأمن السوري العام، ومصادر تؤكد أن وزير الداخلية السوري أمر بفتح تحقيق عاجل. pic.twitter.com/fiT4JpCI3s
— نون سوريا (@NoonPostSY) July 30, 2025
The paths of investigation in these cases differed between judicial inquiries and others conducted within the security institution itself. In Youssef al-Labbad’s case, the public prosecutor in Damascus oversaw the investigation from the outset, and a three-member medical committee was formed to determine the cause of death before the findings were referred to the competent judiciary. In the death of Abdul Rahman Jaajoul inside the al-Kallaseh police station, Aleppo Internal Security announced the formation of an investigative committee and the referral of the body to forensic medicine, without official sources that covered the incident announcing final accountability results. As for Mohammed Ghamira’s case, it went beyond its local scope and drew wide attention from activists and figures in the Syrian revolution and on social media, amid rising fears and criticism over the repetition of practices associated with Assad-era security agencies inside detention facilities. This prompted the Interior Ministry to form an investigative committee that concluded Ghamira had been slapped during interrogation and referred the investigator concerned to the public prosecution. The investigation was expanded to include other officials in the department.
But the mere difference in investigative tracks raises an important question about whether internal procedures are sufficient when the accused of abuse belongs to the same security apparatus. So how should such cases be handled? And what procedures are necessary?
Issmat Abbsi — a researcher, political analyst, former judge, and former head of the Dar al-Adl Court in Hauran during the opposition period in Daraa — told NoonPost that internal procedures alone are not enough, because they are often managed by the same institution that is supposed to hold itself accountable, making them vulnerable to concealment or mitigation. He stressed that the essential guarantees begin with the independence of the investigation, so that it is handled by the public prosecution or an independent judicial committee that includes independent forensic doctors and lawyers, with a separation between the accusing authority and the investigating authority. He also pointed to the need to immediately suspend the powers of suspects to prevent them from influencing witnesses or records, and to announce the results of the investigation to the public to ensure accountability.
Where is independent oversight?
The absence of independent oversight is a key factor in the continuation of abuses inside police corridors and detention centers. The issue goes beyond the powers of security personnel to the existence of a neutral party that monitors how those powers are applied and deals seriously with abuses committed by members of the institution itself.
The problem begins with the daily details accompanying detention: Who documents the reason for detention and its location? Who ensures the detainee’s family is informed? Who reviews the conditions and duration of interrogation? How can the detainee or their family file a complaint about mistreatment? And to whom is the complaint submitted when the party being complained against belongs to the same institution conducting the investigation?
These questions become even more important when an injury or death occurs inside a detention facility, while such incidents raise another question: Are the abuses isolated cases, or do they reflect a broader pattern within the institution? In this context, Issmat Abbsi told NoonPost that distinguishing between an individual error and an institutional pattern depends on repetition and consistency across cases. If similar cases recur within the same apparatus or over a short period without real accountability for managers, that may indicate an institutional pattern. But he believes that this factor is not currently available in the cases at hand.
In the same context, Syrian People’s Assembly member and political activist Aqeel Hussein believes that the occurrence of some mistakes and abuses inside government institutions, including the security and police institutions affiliated with the Interior Ministry, is to be expected, considering that this type of institution may witness errors and abuses by virtue of the nature of its work. But he distinguishes between individual abuses and systematic violations, saying there is a “clear and strict policy” on the part of the Interior Ministry to monitor the performance of the security and police institutions and hold accountable those proven to have committed abuses.
Hussein added that this follow-up has led, in his estimation, to a “major and clear decline” in the number and severity of abuse cases witnessed in Interior Ministry institutions, considering current cases to fall under individual actions by some officers or police personnel and not to reflect a systematic policy. He sees this path as reflecting a clear orientation toward breaking with the policies of the former regime in dealing with citizens.
As for the role of the judiciary and the public prosecution, Issmat believes that “their role should not be limited to dealing with violations after they occur, but should extend to overseeing detention procedures from the very beginning,” proposing the creation of a central, immediate national register of detainees that would allow the judiciary to track detentions and transfers and ensure that lawyers and families have access to detainees from the first moment, alongside activating independent and mandatory medical examinations. He also points to the importance of scrutinizing the integrity of personnel before appointing or promoting them, in order to prevent the practices of the previous era from being carried over into the new institutions.
Inherited violence
These abuses are also linked to a social culture that has long associated authority with fear. Beating, humiliation and intimidation were common means of discipline within the family and the school, and they extended into workplaces and society. Over time, individuals carried these concepts with them into their places of work, particularly inside security institutions.
This behavior appears in the way detainees are treated and in how employees use their powers according to their own notions of discipline and punishment. Hence the importance of training, oversight and accountability in regulating security practice, alongside setting clear controls on the use of force in a way that preserves detainees’ dignity and rights.
On the other hand, political opposition to the Assad regime does not necessarily mean rejecting violence in all its forms. A person may oppose the regime politically while at the same time accepting behavior such as beating and humiliation in daily life. Therefore, a new professional culture must be established based on continuous training, oversight and accountability, one that regulates the exercise of authority and the use of force, and thus founds a relationship based on respect for citizens’ rights between the state and members of society.
A response to public pressure
Alongside oversight and investigative mechanisms within state institutions, another factor emerged during this period in dealing with abuses: the rise in public objection and the transformation of some cases into matters of public opinion, especially through social media and protest vigils. Syrian activist and journalist Ghassan Yassin places this interaction within the framework of a new relationship between society and government institutions, particularly on the security file, in light of the Syrian memory associated with arrest and detention practices during the Assad era.
Asked by NoonPost about the impact of these abuses on people’s trust in institutions and the new government, and whether the rise in objection and demands for accountability reflects a shift in society’s relationship with security institutions, Yassin replied that public objection to detention operations was very high, and that these protests contributed, in his estimation, to pushing the government to review some of its procedures.
Yassin believes the government’s response to these cases has been good and is improving, noting that whenever any problem turned into a matter of public opinion, the government would take measures, whether through the Justice Ministry or the Interior Ministry. He added that things have moved over time in a better direction, and that detention cases without a clear judicial or legal process have begun to almost disappear. There have also been responses in arrest cases, such that in later cases it became possible to know the whereabouts of a disappeared or detained person.
Yassin links this development to public pressure, saying that when any issue becomes a matter of public opinion, it pushes the government to review its course and performance and provide solutions. He sees these solutions as “satisfactory and sufficient,” given that the government is only a year and a half old, and expects things to improve over time.
As for the rise in objection and demands for accountability, Yassin said, “People ultimately want to reach a situation that is legally, judicially and socially acceptable, in which the issue of detention is clear and guarantees the detainee the right to defend himself through a lawyer.” He believes reaching this formula needs some time, but considers that the means of protest used — most of them through social media alongside some protest vigils — “served the intended purpose.”
Yassin describes this relationship as a formula that can be relied upon between a society that rose up and brought down the Assad regime after 14 years of “the destruction left by the fugitive regime,” and a new government that is a year and a half old and is trying to control the security situation amid the fragility of the first phase of liberation, then move toward institutionalizing its work. He added that the Interior Ministry is witnessing “a more than good process of institutionalization, and this is something to build on.”
It cannot be denied that state institutions have entered a phase of restructuring that has included their structures, procedures, and oversight and accountability mechanisms. Yet the daily incidents and frictions inside these institutions remain the true test that reveals the scale of the tangible change people seek — and for which the revolution was launched — something Syrians are counting on in the process of rebuilding the state.
