Date: Dec 18, 2019 Source: The Daily Star Over 170 Syria IDPs arrested after return Nick Newsom| The Daily Star BEIRUT: More than 170 internally displaced Syrians have been arrested after leaving the U.S.-protected Rukban encampment in south-east Syria, the Syrian Association for Citizen’s Dignity said. Russian forces had allegedly guaranteed their safety prior to their departure from the desert camp, the NGO said over the weekend. “SACD can confirm that [Syrian President Bashar] Assad’s security services have arrested at least 174 people who returned from Rukban camp to the so-called shelters in Homs,” the NGO tweeted. SACD said those arrested were mainly military defectors and youth who failed to report for military service, and that they had been transferred to “terrorist courts.” Residents of Rukban have been under great pressure to leave since pro-regime forces cut off the camp’s supply routes last year. The U.N., in its September update on Rukban, wrote that food insecurity had reached “critical levels” in the camp. Most residents are now taking increasingly desperate measures to meet their needs, including sending their children to work, and missing meals, the update said. SACD reported that the men who left the camp and were later arrested had been guaranteed a “personal settlement” by the Assad regime and Russian forces, that would “supposedly protect them from persecution and forced recruitment.” The Russian Embassy in Syria was unable to comment on these allegations when contacted by The Daily Star Monday. However, discussions have taken place between Rukban residents and Russian forces to set up a mechanism to provide security clearances for residents before they leave the Rukban camp. “The Russian forces are the ones who opened reconciliation offices and gave guarantees to the displaced that they would not be exposed [to persecution] after they leave the camp,” the head of Rukban’s public relations committee, Shukri Shihab, previously told Syrian TV channel Halab Today. “Up to a certain point, residents were able to submit their names [to the Russians] while in the camp, and they were then told if there was an issue or not,” a source familiar with the matter told The Daily Star. “This process is now done at the Homs shelters,” the source added. The Syrian government has set up five shelters to process those who leave Rukban through official routes. Aid groups, however, say there is a lack of effective oversight at these shelters. Danielle Moylan, a spokesperson for the U.N., told The Daily Star that the organization has intermittent access to the shelters where the displaced Syrians were allegedly arrested. She said that the U.N. visited two of the Homs shelters on Nov. 12 and 25, “with the permission of the government of Syria.” But she said that more “sustained and regular access” was needed and had been repeatedly called for by the U.N. According to Moylan, the U.N. is actively looking into the arrest of the displaced Syrians, “reaching as many sources as possible.” She said that the investigation “may take some time” to complete. The dangers faced by Syrians returning to government-held areas are well documented. The United Nations Human Rights Council’s August 2019 report on Syria, for instance, notes the regime’s widespread use of arbitrary detention, kidnapping, and enforced disappearances. The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic, which compiled the report for the U.N., is also currently reviewing alleged cases of rape and sexual violence perpetrated against returnees in regime-controlled areas.