Rights group accuses Syrian regime of arresting civilians for forced conscription

The Syrian Human Rights Network has accused the Syrian regime of arresting civilians for forced army conscription, saying it has documented more than 1,000 cases of arrest for this purpose in the past six weeks alone.

In a report released yesterday, the human rights organisation said that “since the beginning of November and up to 15 December, more than 1,217 young men have been arrested for conscription into the ranks of the regime forces; about half of them have official approval to defer military service.”

“Among those arrested, nearly 358 are university students. The majority of detention incidents took place in the province of Damascus as well as the provinces of Aleppo, Hama, Latakia and Homs, according to witnesses,” the report added.

According to the NGO, “early in November the regime authorities distributed lists of dozens of thousands of young men for conscription to fight with the army, local militias, or under the command of foreign militants and circulated them to recruitment centres in the provinces under its control.”

The report explained that the lists included “the names of young people aged 25 to 35 years old, including government employees and university students, even though [these individuals] had obtained formal approval to postpone their mandatory military service.” It added that “doctors and nurses over the age of 45 years old have [also] been informed to report to regime military field hospitals.”

“After being arrested, these young people are referred to the military police headquarters then to the frontline to fight against armed opposition factions.”

According to the report, the aim is to compensate the huge shortage of manpower in the government forces, especially after a significant portion of local militias defected to European countries to seek asylum – in addition to trying to gain back land taken my militias after receiving strong aerial support from Russian forces after 30 September.

The Network added that a further reason for the recruitment drive is to solicit bribes and blackmail from youths who want to have their names deleted from these lists, thus representing a potential revenue stream for officers in the recruitment centres, Ministry of Defence and military police.