Syrian fighters take up position near a prison in Ghweran district in Hasaka, northeastern Syria, on January 21. The prison was the scene of an inmate uprising that lasted for several days. Photo by Ahmed Mardnli/EPA-EFE
Feb. 4 (UPI) — Hundreds of boys are missing from a Syria prison after an inmate uprising last month that brought clashes between U.S.-backed Kurdish forces and Islamic State prisoners, global watchdog Human Rights Watch said Friday.
Inmates attacked the guards at the prison, located in the Ghweran section of al-Hasakah, on Jan. 20. It took the Syrian Democratic Forces a few days to regain control of the facility.
“The Syrian Democratic Forces began evacuating men and boys from the besieged prison days ago, yet the world still has no idea how many are alive or dead,” Letta Tayler, Human Rights Watch associate crisis and conflict director, said in a statement.
The Human Rights Watch report said the SDF “should immediately allow international human rights groups to visit the detainees it has evacuated or recaptured” and provide them with essential care.
The group also said Friday that the U.S. and Mexican governments have subjected more than 20,000 children to serious risk under the Migrant Protection Protocols, also known as the “Remain in Mexico” program.
The international human rights organization said data show that at least 21,300 asylum-seeking children were sent with their families to ” Mexican border cities” under the program.
“The data shows how many children the Trump administration wrongly sent to dangerous conditions in Mexico, many of them still there a year after President Joe Biden came into office with pledges to end this program,” Ari Sawyer, U.S. border researcher at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.
The group said efforts to account for the missing children and families are on hold, and accused the U.S. government of leaving vulnerable asylum seekers stranded.