The Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression (SCM) has been awarded this year's Civil Rights Defender Award. Now the organization's program director Yara Bader and project coordinator Raghda Sheikh talk about their experiences and how they see the future of Syria.
– I'm happy that the future is on its way, says Yara Bader.
In the airy conference room, colleagues Yara Bader and Raghda Sheikh are sitting with a cup of coffee each. A few days earlier, they had landed in springtime Stockholm to receive the annual award from the human rights organization Civil Rights Defenders. They say it is a great honor for their organization Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression (SCM):
– We are very proud and we hope that it can shine a light on the work we are doing to achieve justice. Many people thought that the war in Syria was something that happened far away. Because the world allowed it to happen without justice being served andwithout anyone being held accountable, we should not be surprised that the same thing is happening today in Ukraine, says Yara Bader.
SCM was founded in 2004 by Mazen Darwish, the husband of journalist and program director Yara Bader. At the time, the organization's primary mission was to document the deprivation of liberty and torture that journalists endured under the rule of dictator Bashar al-Assad.
Missing and imprisoned colleagues
When the civil war broke out in 2011, SCM expanded its activities to document the torture, disappearances, and killings committed by the regime and military groups in the country. This eventually led to the founding of its sister organization, the Violations Documentation Center (VDC), which quickly became the target of repression by the Assad regime.
“One of the most difficult moments in our work with SCM was when Yara, Mazen and 12 other colleagues were arrested by the Syrian secret police who broke into the office in Damascus. Our colleague Razan Zaitouneh, a well-known human rights activist and one of the VDC leaders, was also kidnapped together with a colleague in Douma in 2013. She is still forcibly disappeared and we do not know her whereabouts,” says Raghda Sheikh, lawyer and project coordinator at VDC.
Yara Bader was imprisoned for four months after her arrest, while her husband was only released three and a half years later.
“We were five female colleagues imprisoned together, so I wasn't alone. That made it easier, as torture was common with such a regime in power. However, I think the hardest part was that we wanted our families to know where we were,” she says.
“A mixture of happiness and sadness”
In 2016, the organization was re-established in exile in Paris, despite several members having disappeared or remaining imprisoned. Since then, SCM has used its extensive documentation as evidence in legal proceedings all over the world – including Sweden.
It is mainly representatives of the Assad government that the SCM is trying to bring to justice for human rights and war crimes. Bader and Sheikh also say that they are pursuing a case against members of the Russian paramilitary Wagner Group, which has fought on Russia's side in Ukraine.
When Bashar al-Assad's regime finally collapsed in December 2024, thousands of political prisoners were released from regime prisons. The liberation of the infamous Saydnaya prison, which has been called a "slaughterhouse for humans," brought both hope and pain to Raghda Sheikh.
“As a documentation worker, I knew which victims were imprisoned, and we all sat waiting for them to be released one by one. It was really a mixture of happiness for those who were released and sadness for those who are still missing,” she says.
According to Yara Bader, some Syrian organizations estimate that up to 150 people are still missing, although it is difficult to determine an exact figure.
“Reconstruction is not just about buildings”
At the end of March, Syria's new transitional government was sworn in. Raghda Sheikh and Yara Bader both welcome the change, even though the violence has not completely stopped. In March 2025, over 1 Alawite civilians, the minority group to which former dictator Assad belonged, were murdered. when fighting broke out between government forces and armed groups. SCM says they are continuing their documentation work, and that no actor will escape scrutiny.
Meanwhile, Bader and Sheikh hope that SCM can gradually move more of its staff back to Damascus as Syria rebuilds. They are pleased that US and EU sanctions on the country have been lifted, and say that Syrian civil society will have an important role in the coming years.
– Reconstruction is not just about buildings. We need to build the whole idea, identity and future of Syria. We are of course concerned about how freedom and democracy will be protected, but right now we see an opportunity to work for these values from within the country. I am happy that the future is on the way, says Yara Bader.
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