Mother Jones obtains Syrian government hit list containing thousands of names

producermatthew:

From Mother Jones:

A 718-page digital document obtained by Mother Jones contains names, phone numbers, neighborhoods, and alleged activities of thousands of dissidents apparently targeted by the Syrian government. Three experts asked separately by Mother Jones to examine the document—essentially a massive spreadsheet, whose contents are in Arabic—say they believe that it is authentic. As Bashar Al-Assad’s military continues a deadly crackdown on dissent inside the country, the list appears to confirm in explicit detail the scale of the regime’s domestic surveillance and its methodical efforts to destroy widespread opposition.

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“The way it’s organized looks similar to other documents I’ve seen,” said Syrian expert Andrew Tabler, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “It organizes people in such a way that it would allow the security services to be able to track them down.”