Inside Syria’s new digital prison museum
Shafaq News – Damascus
A team of Syrian journalists and activists has launched the Syrian Prisons Museum, a digital project designed to document alleged detention facilities once used across the country, most notoriously Saydnaya Prison.
The archive, online since September 15, allows visitors to take virtual 360-degree tours of execution chambers and cells, view writings left by detainees, and listen to recorded testimonies from survivors.
Read more: On International Day: Over 181,000 people remain forcibly disappeared in Syria.
Speaking to Shafaq News, Omar Alwan, the museum’s director of photography, said the initiative was created to be accessible worldwide. “Visitors can walk virtually through the walls, see the symbols and writings prisoners left behind, and hear their stories,” he explained, noting that the team chose a digital format to ensure longevity and reach.
Alwan described difficulties in completing the documentation, including damage to Saydnaya after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime and logistical hurdles that forced the team to import 3D imaging equipment from Europe. So far, 70 sites have been covered, with a target of more than 100.
"The project avoids graphic imagery, instead focusing on visual records and human memory," he added.
In addition to Syrian prisons, the archive includes facilities once run by ISIS in Iraq and Syria, as well as prisons operated under Iraq’s former regime.
