The Syrian "Prisoner" CNN Freed From A Hidden Prison Was Actually An Al-Assad Regime Intelligence Officer
The CNN report was seen as a mockery of the suffering that Syrians endured in Assad’s prisons.
After widespread backlash over a CNN report showing its chief correspondent, Clarissa Ward, discovering a prisoner in a hidden detention facility in Syria that many said was staged, Syrian fact checkers have found the “prisoner” in the video was using a false identity and is actually a former lieutenant in Syria’s Air Force Intelligence.
During Ward’s report, shared on Thursday, Dec. 12, she entered the prison with a rebel fighter and found a prisoner who had reportedly been left in a windowless cell, hiding under a blanket and unaware that rebels had freed Syria from President Bashar al-Assad’s regime.
The prisoner identified himself as Adel Ghurbal and claimed to have been imprisoned for three months.
But people online promptly pointed out that the report might be staged as the prisoner appeared too well groomed for someone who had been incarcerated in the regime’s notoriously brutal prisons.
Following the broadcast, the Syrian fact-checking group Verify-Sy conducted an investigation and concluded that the man was not who he claimed to be.
Instead, the group identified him as Salama Mohammad Salama, a former lieutenant in Syria’s Air Force Intelligence, who also tortured people under the Assad regime.
Salama, also known as “Abu Hamza,” was responsible for several security checkpoints in Homs, according to Verify-Sy.
He had a long history of stealing, imposing taxes and forcibly recruiting informants to gather information for his benefit, Verify-Sy said.
Salama also participated in military operations in 2014 and killed civilians.
He is responsible for torturing and arresting many people in Syria, without charges, and on false charges if they refused to pay money or work for him, or simply because he was uncomfortable with the faces of some, according to testimonies from the families of the deceased and survivors that Verify-Sy team obtained.
Since Dec. 8, people have expressed their empathy for the plight of prisoners in Syria, particularly after the shocking footage and testimonies that came out of Sednaya prison, known as the “human slaughterhouse.”
However, the CNN report was seen as a mockery of the suffering that Syrians endured in al-Assad’s prisons.
“This seems so staged and makes a mockery of all the suffering and pain endured by those who passed through Sednaya. It really is shameful,” a person wrote on Reddit.
“Here, we, as Syrians first and journalists second, have the right to ask: Did the esteemed network deliberately mislead its audience to whitewash the reputation of 'Abu Hamza,' or did it fall into the trap of misinformation? If so, what led it to fall into this trap at a time when Syrians have succeeded in proving what the entire world has failed to document regarding the crimes and violations committed against them for decades?” Verify-Sy said.
CNN has since confirmed its error but did not issue an apology for its false reporting.
Ward faced similar accusations of staging her reporting about Israel’s genocide in Gaza, when Ward and her team reportedly had to take cover from rockets by Hamas in a live report from Israel.
People on social media have accused Ward of being a "crisis actor" and said that her actions were staged to create a dramatic narrative.
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