The regime replaces checkpoints of its Army with intelligence in the vicinity of the Eastern Ghouta and conducts sweep and search operations with the “reconciliation” fighters in search of buried weapons
Rif Dimashq Province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights: the regime forces continue their security operations and clamping down on residents of the Eastern Ghouta who remain in the cities and towns of Ghouta, where the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitored the regime forces carrying out scrutiny and research in the registers of people getting in and out of the Eastern Ghouta, to check whether they are wanted for security authorities, and the reliable sources confirmed to the Syrian Observatory that the regime forces recently replaced the checkpoints of its military forces in the vicinity of the Eastern Ghouta, in areas such as al-Maliha and Ein Tera as well as the checkpoints of the Republican Guard Forces, with checkpoints of forces of its security branches including the branch of Air intelligence and State Security, also the reliable sources confirmed to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights that the regime forces in recent days have carried out inspection operations in al-Muhammadiyah area, al-Ashari farms and the orchards of the al-Marj area, where they inspect the area on a daily bases and search for concealed weapons, where the regime forces in the inspections are accompanied by specialists carrying equipment to detect the buried weapons, as well as former fighters in the ranks of the factions that used to working in the Eastern Ghouta, of who have “settled their situations”.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights published on the 26th of August 2018 that the Syrian Observatory for Human Right monitored the regime forces carrying out raids and detentions in the Eastern Ghouta in Rif Dimashq, where sources confirmed to the Syrian Observatory that the regime forces are carrying out daily and consecutive raids in the cities and towns of the Eastern Ghouta, in search of “wanted” people, the regime forces also take them to security branches in the capital Damascus in order to be investigated and interrogated about specific issues, while the locals and some of those arrested and released told that the investigations are related to the communication with the displaced people from the Eastern Ghouta to the Syrian north and the presence of their children in the Syrian north, and the former work with institutions belong to opposition, regional or international parties, where the numbers of people arrested reached about 300 during the last week.
The Syrian Observatory published in the past few days that the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitored that the regime forces carried out raids and searching processes in the towns and cities of the Eastern Ghouta of Damascus, in the past 72 hours, where these processes were carried out successively and simultaneously in the towns and cities of the area, in searching for wanted who were arrested and taken to the regime’s security branches, the sources confirmed to the SOHR that the arrests targeted more than 150 persons in the past 72 hours, through the International Security Intelligence, and these processes also targeted a majority of the persons who were arrested on charge of “investigating the sources of finance of the relief and medical institutions in the Eastern Ghouta”, amid resentment against the arrests which target the residents of the area and of those who refused to leave it, from time to time.
Intersected confirmed on the 18th of August 2018, to the Syrian Observatory, that the regime forces carried out raids during the last hours of the night in KafrBatna town in the Eastern Ghouta, where the Syrian Observatory monitored raids into the houses of the town which used to be controlled by Rahman Corps prior to its displacement of it, where the raids lasted for several hours and resulted in arrests of people of whom local sources reported that they have been arrested after the regime forces claimed that they were wanted, where about 30 people (6 of them used to work for the Revolutionary Local Council in KafrBatna town) were arrested, and these arrests come as a new episode in the series of raids, searches and detentions which are carried out by the regime forces and its security branches, against the remaining inhabitants of the Eastern Ghouta, where the raids are being carried out occasionally in towns, cities, and farms of the Eastern Ghouta searching for “wanted” or weapons, in conjunction with summoning certain people according to nominal lists in order to carry out investigations with the people who worked in relief, humanitarian, medical, and military institutions, local councils, rescue teams, and civil defense, during the period of control of the Islamic factions in the Eastern Ghouta, prior to the displacement of tens of thousands of civilians and fighters towards the Syrian north, where the Syrian Observatory monitored people who had previously served in the civil defense being called by branches of regime’s security, which conducted investigations with them and returned them to the Eastern Ghouta, without allowing them to leave it.
Also the regime forces have made incumbent upon the residents of the Eastern Ghouta, to get a “security approval”, in the case that they desire to leave towards the capital Damascus, and local sources confirmed to the Syrian Observatory that the regime’s checkpoints provided that the residents of the Eastern Ghouta have to head towards the officers who are in charge of the Eastern Ghouta, in order to obtain a “departure permission”, in order to be allowed to leave through the checkpoints to the capital Damascus, and the locals confirmed that this document is given after a quick investigation to those who request the “departure permission”, and the investigation includes questions about their relatives and those who remained of them inside Ghouta, and those who left towards the Syrian North or outside Syria, while sources talked about the fact that the regime forces prevented those who used to work in medic and relief fields, or within parties opposed to the regime in the Eastern Ghouta, and stayed in the Eastern Ghouta to have their situations settled, from leaving towards Damascus.