Syria's White Helmets rescuers announce end to search at notorious prison

Syria's White Helmets rescue group announced Tuesday the end of search operations at the notorious Saydnaya prison without finding further detainees.

"The White Helmets announce the conclusion of search operations for possible remaining detainees in potential undiscovered secret cells and basements" at the facility, said a statement. "The search did not uncover any unopened or hidden areas within the facility."

- SAYDNAYA NIGHTMARE -

At the core of the system of rule that Assad inherited from his father Hafez was a brutal complex of prisons and detention centres used to eliminate dissent by those suspected of stepping out of the ruling Baath party's line.

Thousands of Syrians gathered Monday outside a jail synonymous with the worst atrocities of Assad's rule to search for relatives, many of whom had spent years in the Saydnaya facility outside Damascus, AFP correspondents said.

Rescuers from the Syrian White Helmets group had earlier said they were looking for potential secret doors or basements in Saydnaya.

"I ran like crazy" to get to the prison, said Aida Taha, 65, searching for her brother who was arrested in 2012.

"But I found out that some of the prisoners were still in the basements. There are three or four floors underground."

Crowds of freed prisoners wandered the streets of Damascus distinguishable by the marks of their ordeal: maimed by torture, weakened by illness and emaciated by hunger.