The witness of horror

A village with 20 000 inhabitants somewhere in Europe. “Sami” (51) has been living here for five years now. Sami is a cover name, because Sami is a Syrian refugee – and an enemy of that state.

In 2013, Sami smuggled 53 275 photos out of his home country. They show approximately 11 000 people who were tortured to death. Sami’s laptop contains shocking evidence against Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad and his henchmen.

Faces with the skin peeled off, eye sockets that are pierced out, mouths with teeth knocked out, amputated extremities.

If Assad is charged at the International Court of Justice one day, this material will seal his fate. It makes Sami a key witness. He is subject to a special EU protection programme.

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On the bell next to the door, I read an Arabic name. It’s Sami’s new identity. The Syrian opens the door. “Good morning,” he says with a strong accent. “Come in”. I step into the dark corridor. I am the first journalist to visit Sami here. I am not supposed to write whether it is a house or apartment.

Sami sits down on a leather chair in one corner of his living room. We do not publish photos that show his furniture. The smallest hints could lead the Syrian secret service to him. “Nobody besides my family knows my story” – including his neighbours and friends.

He is of medium height, more or less slim, and is beginning to bald – nothing unusual for a man his age. Sami does not stick out.

There is only the two of us, no interpreter, no photographer. Sami is afraid of being betrayed. He calls a friend who translates our Arabic-English conversation via the mobile phone speakers. Even in exile, Sami is being careful. “I am the prisoner of my photos,” he says. “I know of Assad secret service officials who spy on Syrian citizens in Europe.”

Without Sami, there would be no “Caesar files” today – the name under which the photos became known in 2014. They are named after Sami’s relative “Caesar” (cover name).

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He worked as a military photographer for the regime, talking pictures of crimes and accidents in which the soldiers were involved – until the civil war broke out. In the spring of 2011, his superiors told Caesar, for the first time, to photograph the corpses of tortured prisoners. Allegedly, they were “terrorists”. Caesar had to take pictures of pupils and students who seemingly had protested against Assad. Caesar was shocked, wanted to change sides and confided in Sami.

Sami said: “You have to carry on! We have to collect these photos for the world public. I will help you.” Caesar remained with the army and began to secretly copy the pictures onto USB sticks and smuggle them out of the torture chambers and military hospitals in the evenings, hidden in his heels or belt. Sami then saved them on his computer.

Heads blown off above the nose, faces burnt by chemicals, cut off noses, disembowelments.

The Syrian secret service searched Sami’s house twice and confiscated technical equipment – mobile phones, computers. The laptop with the torture files was hidden elsewhere. “I knew that Assad’s people could come at any time,” he says. “I was afraid of ending up like the people on the photos.”

However, the conviction that the photos would serve as a wake-up call to the West one day kept driving him.

The regime’s mistrust and the inspections in the city kept increasing the longer the war continued. Two of Sami’s cousins were arrested. One of them died in prison, the other is missing to this day.

Dark circles surround Sami’s eyes. “In the evenings, I stay up late to escape from the nightmares,” he says. When he gives in to his tiredness, he wakes up again suddenly while dreaming of Assad’s people capturing him.

With his wife and children, Sami lives in a building that his new home country provides for him. He is at home most of the time. When he goes outside, he takes long walks. He writes poems to calm his soul.

He does everything for his children. Every day, he brings them to school and picks them up again. In the evenings, he reads out Arabian short stories to them.

“My children might have to grow up without me. But they would understand one day that I did what I had to do, in order to help children whose parents were killed.”

Sami dreams of returning to a pacified Syria and wants justice for the victims. Their mistreated bodies haunt him. “The eyeless faces stare at me at night and beg for retribution.” Their pleas became Sami’s life-task.

In 2013, he had an external hard drive with the data smuggled out of Syria by middlemen. Then he left the country himself. He does not want to say, how exactly he did this. “It would endanger the lives of people in Syria.”

Rebel groups helped bring the rest of the family out of Syria. Fleeing to Europe took over a month. It was only when everybody else was safe that his relative Caesar, also fled.

His mission was the most difficult. The regime started to hunt him when he no longer turned up for work. “I thanked God when Caesar was finally out of Syria.”

Sami sits in a dark corner of the living room. Seemingly unaffected, he scrolls through the photo folder of his laptop.

Open flesh wounds that look like a shark’s bite tore off half the thigh. A face with a severed cheek, the teeth exposed at the side.

“By now, I can drink coffee while seeing the pictures,” he says and takes a sip.

“When the photos were published, the world was shocked.” The photos were exhibited in museums, the EU Parliament and the UN main headquarters. Activists showed them to politicians, ministers, heads of state.

Well-respected media like CNN reported on them. Caesar spoke in front of the US congress.

“The photos are out there. But nothing happens. The slaughter in Syria continues,” Sami says, disappointed. His idealism has turned into bitterness. “Humanity has let us down.”

He closes the photo folder and types “flowers” into the browser’s search box. Colourful blossoms appear on the screen. Sami smiles.

German Version Folter-Fotos aus Syrien Der Kronzeuge des Grauens Sami sammelte zwei Jahre grausame Folter-Fotos aus Assads Knästen. Hochriskant! Heute lebt er in Europa – mit neuer Identität.

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