Family of American who died in Syrian custody sues regime

Majd Kamalmaz disappeared in 2017 at a checkpoint outside Damascus

Majd Kamalmaz. Photo courtesy of Ibrahim Kamalmaz

The family of Majd Kamalmaz, an American psychotherapist who disappeared during a trip to Syria in 2017, has filed a lawsuit in the US federal court against the regime of Syrian President Bashar Al Assad.

The lawsuit seeks at least $70 million in punitive and compensatory damages from the Assad regime for the “unlawful detention, torture, and killing” of Dr Kamalmaz, who was 59 when he disappeared.

For years, his wife Hassnaa Kamalmaz and their children called on the regime to release him and desperately tried to raise awareness of his case in the US and abroad.

In May, the family revealed that US intelligence services had told them that in all likelihood, Dr Kamalmaz had died years earlier in regime custody.

In June, the US State Department formally acknowledged his death.

“We support Majd’s family and the families of all those who are missing or unjustly detained in Syria in their quest for accountability,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said at the time.

According to the lawsuit, filed in federal court in Washington, Dr Kamalmaz was kidnapped by the regime at a checkpoint in Mezzeh and then taken to the Mezzeh Military Airport, which the suit alleges is “known for the torture and murder of perceived enemies of the Syrian regime".

The suit states that the Kamalmaz family is “entitled to recover compensatory damages from Syria for economic losses resulting from the premature death of Mr Kamalmaz, including lost anticipated earnings.

“The amount of these compensatory damages shall be determined at trial,” the lawsuit states.

Dr Kamalmaz was an expert in post-traumatic stress disorder and spent much of his career helping people affected by conflict.

He had worked in countries including Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and Indonesia, as well as in the US, where in 2005 he travelled to Mississippi after Hurricane Katrina.

At the time of his disappearance, Dr Kamalmaz was working in Lebanon, where he was running a project researching mental trauma in young Syrian refugees who had fled the civil war.

He also ran a mental health and counselling centre in Abu Dhabi.

Dr Kamalmaz was one of at least two Americans believed to be in Syrian regime detention. The other is journalist Austin Tice, who disappeared in 2012.

The family has made it their mission to hold the Syrian regime accountable.

“I know that if my father was with me right now, he would not rest until all men, women and children are released from the Assad regime's concentration camps,” Dr Kamalmaz's daughter Maryam Kamalmaz said.

“In his honour, we plan to hold the regime fully accountable for its crimes against Americans and Syrians alike, and we call on the US Senate to urgently pass the Assad Anti-Normalisation Act for the sake of Americans still held by this criminal regime.”