The thirty- one years old economics graduate, Kareem Arbaji, has been detained for over two years, since June 7th, 2007, by military intelligence officers.

Human Rights Reports reveal that Arbaji has been tortured during the detention:

Kareem Arbaji was detained before being tried, he received a cruel and disproportionate sentence even if he was convicted. He was tortured during investigations and ill treated for more than two years in prison.

It is likely that Arbaji has been arrested, detained and then sentenced for opinions he expressed on the blocked Syrian forum, Akhawiya, which he used to administrate along with other members. The forum members have created a page to honor and support their friend behind bars. A Facebook group too has been recently created in support of the jailed blogger. Several Syrian bloggers have expressed their anger at the court's order. The Arab bloggers league has also issued a statement denouncing Kareem's sentence.

Below is an excerpt of The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI) report regarding the Syrian court's decision to sentence Kareem Arbaji:

ANHRI requests the Syrian government to immediately release Kareem Arbaji and all prisoners of conscience in Syrian dungeons, to abolish arbitrary detention policy and stop the security interference in judiciary affairs.

ANHRI asserts that the charge against Arbaji is a false one , only used as a pretext to inhibit freedom of expression and repress activists.

ANHRI also urges the Syrian government to eliminate the state security court as it is a stain to the Syrian justice.

Several Syrian and other human rights organizations and websites have joined ANHRI's call to release the jailed blogger.

It is worth to note that along with Kareem Arbaji, Syrian authorities sentenced several Syria bloggers in prison. On 11-5-2008 the State Security Court in Damascus stated its verdict on the Syrian blogger Tariq Biasi who was held in detention since 7-7-2007.

Also Tariq al-Ghorani (1985, assistant engineer) - Maher Ibrahim Esber (1980, a shop owner) - Husam Melhem (1985, a law student) - Omar al-Abdullah (1985, philosophy student) - Diab Siriyyeh (1985, student) - Ayham Saqer (1975, works at a beauty salon) - Allam Fakhour (1979, a student at the Faculty of Fine Arts - Sculpture Department) all were arrested, detained and sentenced for expressing their views on blogs and online forums, particularly on syriandomari blog and Akhawiya.

On Sunday 11-5-2008 the State Security Court in Damascus stated its verdict on the Syrian blogger Tariq Baiasi who was held in detention since 7-7-2007. Tariq was detained for leaving a comment on websites disfavored by the Syrian government. Free Tariq Campaign condemned the State's verdict and asks for freedom to the Syrian blogger:

The State Security Court in Damascus has sentenced Tariq to three years after lessening it from six years to three years (originally, Tariq received three years for each of the following charges):

1- Dwindling the national feeling.

2-Weakening the national ethos.

The militarily security arrested Tariq on 7-7-2007 for leaving a comment on websites considered “suspicious” by the Syrian government.

Since Tariq’s family and their lawyer were reluctant to comment on the State’s verdict, we wish that the human rights’ NGOs uncover details about this news.

Meanwhile, we put in your hands the following report published on 23-2-2008 by Syrian Human Rights Organization (Sawasiya) which briefly talks about Tariq’s case:

On 18-2-2008 the Supreme State Security Court had interrogated Tariq Biasi (1984) who was arrested on 7-7-2007 after charging him with “dwindling the national feeling” and “weakening the national ethos” based on Articles 286-285.

Tariq who was arrested because of a comment left on websites considered “suspicious” by the Syrian government, denied leaving the comment and stated that he saw it only after his arrest. He also asserted that the land line, through which the website was accessed, is not his but for a doctor (there are seven branches for this line and while all of them are used, one of them is used for an internet café).

Tariq explained that he works in computer business and he has nothing to do with politics or anything of the like. His trial was adjourned till 17-3-2008 for the Attorney General to state its demands.

The Syrian bloggers continue to call for freedom to fellow blogger Tariq Baiassi:

This harsh sentence for a merely criticism written in a website, is only an enlightening illustration of the injustice and persecution against any attempt to express the opinion that the Constitution guarantees to all people. (…)
This sentence will not cancel the freedom of expression or shut up the voices demanding their rights guaranteed by the constitution. And Tariq will remain the flame that will not be extinguished and he will still the guide for all the bloggers.

As for the bloggers, they will exercise the freedom that does not hurt anyone, whatever the consequences are!

You can find the Free Tariq campaign by clicking here for an English version, and here for the Arabic.

It all started when one did: Ahmad published several entries concerning the detention of Tariq, the jailed Syrian blogger, but it is only when his blog was added on the SYPlanet aggregator that I had the chance to be aware of Tariq's situation. I reacted by contacting all the bloggers who reported on Tariq's detention and asked for their help in organizing a campaign to help secure Tariq's release. And here we are; Ahmad purchased and designed the websites, Arwa and Omar contacted human rights organizations and news agencies, Okbah is following up Tariq's news with a lawyer, Omar created a group on Facebook. I also contributed by updating the websites and creating an online petition demanding Tariq's release.

As it stands, we're just five. We are five Syrian bloggers writing from our censored Syria.

You can find our Free Tariq campaign by clicking here for an English version, and here for the Arabic.

Our Statement:

Our mission is supposedly guaranteed in the introduction of Syria's Constitution: “The freedom of the country is only protected by free citizens.”

Article 28 in the constitution dictates that: “Every accused person is innocent until he is convicted by a final court judgment.”

Tariq’s online speech does not constitute a violation of the law. In fact, he actually acted on the basis of freedom, which as stated earlier, is guaranteed by the Constitution via Article 38, which states: “Every citizen has the right to express his opinion freely and openly, orally and written and in all other means of expression. He also has the right to contribute in the control process and in the constructive criticism to ensure the safety of national reconstruction.”

Feel free to read the full statement.

Please take a minute and consider signing our petition.

You can also help us spread the word by joining our group on Facebook.

If you wish to post a banner of solidarity on your blog or website, you may choose from a list of banners here. Insert the image URL within the code here and you'll get a badge of the banner you've chosen. Please contact us for any questions, or if you have a banner of your own to contribute.

Why Support Us?

Some of the arguments made unfortunately undermine the effectiveness of the likes of this campaign, assuming that there is one goal, which is simply and strictly to literally “free” the imprisoned blogger or person. This campaign however goes way beyond such claims and aims to protect the very principles of freedom and human rights. To answer and refute some of these arguments, the Free Tariq Coalition has interviewed the Syrian human rights activist and lawyer Razan Zeituna and asked her a couple of questions regarding the validity of such campaigns:

Free Tariq: Are these campaigns important? If so, in what sense?

رزان زيتونة: ‫هذه الحملات مهمة جدا، أهم ما فيها أنها أخرجت قضايا حريات الرأي والتعبير من ثنائية العلاقة ما بين المنظمات الحقوقية والسلطة، لتجعل منها قضية رأي عام، تهم دوائر أوسع من الأفراد والجماعات‬
‫وهي إلى جانب الاهتمام ب والدفاع عن أفراد بعينهم تعرضوا لانتهاكات في حقوقهم وحرياتهم الأساسية، تنشر الوعي بقضية الحريات والانتهاكات‬.
‫هذا من جانب، من جانب آخر، مضى زمن طويل في منطقتنا العربية، حيث كانت مختلف الانتهاكات تمارس بحق الأفراد بدون أي اهتمام إعلامي وحقوقي فعلي، هذا الأمر بدأ يتغير الآن، هذه الحملات إلى جانب ما تمارسه من ضغط معنوي على السلطات الحاكمة، تعطي الأفراد المنتهكة حقوقهم جزءا مما يستحقونه، باعتبارهم أفراد لهم أسماء وأحلام …الخ، أي أنها تؤنسن هذه القضايا‬ ‫وتنقلها من إطار العموميات والمجرد إلى إطار الشخصي‬.

Razan Zeituna: These campaigns are very important, mostly for unleashing the freedom of speech causes from the dual relationship between the regime and human rights organizations, to make it a public affair that would interest wider circles of people and groups. And while these campaigns lobby for and defend people whose basic rights and freedoms are abused, they also raise awareness on the cause for free speech.
Furthermore, it has been a long time in the Arab region since human rights abuses been taken place without effectual attention from media and human rights agencies. This is changing now; these kinds of campaigns and as they put symbolic pressure on the government, it gives the individuals whose rights are invaded, part of what they deserve, and treat them as people with names and dreams…these kinds of campaigns personify and humanize the abstract causes and transfer them from generalizations frames into personal frames.

Free Tariq: What about Tariq himself, how would this campaign be beneficial to him?

رزان زيتونة: هي حق له قبل أن تكون مفيدة له أم لا،‬ ‫في مثل أنظمتنا، الحكومات لا تكترث كثيرا بالضغوط من هذا النوع، هذا لا يعني أبدا أن لا تمارس مثل هذه الضغوط‬.

Razan Zeituna: It's his right, before it can be beneficial to him or not. With governments like ours, these kinds of pressures don’t affect the regimes much; this is no reason why we should not practice these pressures in the first place.

And Esra'a Al Shafei, director of the Free Kareem campaign notes that the aim of activism is “to change,” and stresses on the movement of change:

Activists generally have a passion towards a set of issues that they feel need to be changed, and they are inspired enough to be part of the movement that changes these things, either partly or entirely (if they are part of a movement that is big and influential enough, but most activism today comes in very small doses.)

In other words, campaigns like this one might qualify as a form of “activism” (though I like to refer to it as “volunteerism”), help serve a major role in communities that suffer from decades of dictatorship like that of Syria. The Free Tariq Coalition can advocate and promote national ownership, and harnessing citizen participation within the process of the country's development that has been exclusively up to the Syrian authorities and to Syrian opposition(s). Campaigning, volunteering, or being active is not only about raising awareness about Tariq's case or about freedom of speech, but also about the necessity for all Syrian people and youth to contribute and to participate instead of comforting to the paralyzed community state the Syrian regime managed to build for decades by force.

Syrian Bloggers Under Threat

Tariq Biasi is not the only and the first Syrian blogger who is currently in prison, long before I have started this blog about a year ago, a Syrian blogger named Tariq Gorani was detained on 19-2-2006 for a year and four months before being charged with a seven years sentence verdict on 17-6-2007 for “endangering Syria's security”. His blog's name was Aldomari. “Aldomari” is originally taken from the first and the last independent Syrian newspaper that addressed and investigated the corruption of the Syrian authorities for a few months before it was shut down by the regime. (Aldomari was a revolutionary newspaper and though its price was five times the official newspapers', its editions were always sold out.)

I could not read any post by the blogger Aldomari for the Syrian authorities have hacked his blog and deleted all his posts' archive, all I know is that he blogs in Arabic and his posts were seethingly sarcastic. Aldomari blog was the first Syrian blog to be blocked by the Syrian authorities as reported by the Damascene blog.

Tariq Gorani (1985) was not detained only for his blogging activity, he was mainly detained and imprisoned along with his seven friends for establishing a “Democratic Syrian Youth Activity.” Because of their online organized activism, they faced harsh and serious verdicts with seven and five years sentences.

A campaign has been launched to support the young men can be found here.

‫‬

So basically whoever initiates to express and voice his/her opinions in an organized manner, they are detained and imprisoned for years. Which explains the decreasing amount of Syrian insiders who care about Syrian public affairs.

Tariq Biasi is detained for an online comment criticizing the government, but Tariq Gorani was detained and faced serious charges and is spending seven years in prison not for expressing his views as much as for expressing them within an establishment and an organized body. Hence Syrian insiders prefer to work independently, mostly anonymously and not in groups.

Another example of harassment by the authority towards Syrian bloggers is when the Syrian intelligence kidnapped Syrian bloggeress Rukana Hammour. She is very vocal about the authorities and judicial system's corruption in Syria, and was thus threatened by the intelligence forces to withdraw her nomination to the Syrian parliament.

How You Can Help:

1. Write about Tariq or freedom of online speech on your site or blog.
2. Link to our campaign.
3. Email your friends about us and ask them to sign the petition.
4. Contact NGOs and media agencies in your circles.
5. Email us campaign-related feedbacks and suggestions.

His name is Tarek Baiasi and he's 23 years old. He lives in Banyas with his mother and two sisters. His father was detained during the 80s by the Syrian security agents, who mistook him for a Muslim Brotherhood member, where he spent 20 years behind bars.

Tarek sells and maintains PCs. He is described by his friends as shy and quiet, spending his time surfing the web and blogging at Ektub here.

On 7-7-2007, Tarek was asked by the security branch in Banyas to answer a few questions concerning a comment he left on one of the “sensitive” websites. That was the last time his family heard from him.

I had previously mentioned Tarek on my blog when I posted about the kidnapping of the Syrian bloggeress Rukana Hammour by Syrian security agents, but had not heard anything new about him until yesterday when Syrian bloggers reported on the day which marked the completion of his six months of detention. The bloggers appealed to Syrian and international human rights agencies to highlight his case and the cases of others as well.

Syrian blogger Ahmad was the first to write about Tarek's case:

اعتقل طارق بياسي بتاريخ 7-7-2007م.

- سبب اعتقاله تعليق له في منتدى أنا مسلم تعرّض فيه لإيجابيات وسلبيات أجهزة الأمن.

- بعد اعتقاله فُتّش منزله ، و صودرت حواسيبه.

- انتهى التحقيق معه لكونه اعترف بتعليقه مباشرة، لكن لحد الآن لم يُحال للمحكمة ، و لا يُعرف مصيره.

- طارق وحيد لأمه ، من مواليد 84 ، من مدينة بانياس الساحلية.

- اعتقل أبوه لمدة 20 عاماً من أيام الأحداث ، كان عُمْرُ طارقٍ حينها بضعة أشهر فقط

Ahmad posted several posts earlier on Tarek's detention in which we learn that the detained blogger was later on taken to Palestine Camp's security branch in Damascus:

لتصفحه مواقع انترنت ، طارق مازال في معتقلا في فرع فلسطين بدمشق طارق عمر بياسي ، مواليد 84، يعمل في محله في بيع أجهزة الكمبيوتر و صيانتها الكائن في مدينة بانياس الساحلية. لم يكن الدكتور عمر منظما في جماعة الإخوان و لا أحسبه مقتنعا بأفكارهم حتى يومنا هذا عن تهمة طارق فهي تصفحه و مشاركته في مواقع “مشبوهة” و ينظر لها بعين الريبة من قبل الأمن ، و هذه المواقع على الأغلب هي موقع أنا مسلم و موقع آخر شبيه به

Another Syrian blogger, Jassas, blogs about Tarek's case asking us to write to the Syrian human rights agencies and support Tarek. Marfa' blog owner, too, adds his voice to Jassas' appeal and asks us to shed some light on Tarek's case by contacting human rights agencies.

Arwa wishes that all the bloggers would agree on a certain statement to publish on their blogs:

أتمنى من جميع المدونات أن تتفق على “خطاب نصي” يشارك فيه المدونون كخطوة عملية وجماعية من أجل طارق

And finally, the owner of Msabba' el Karat Syrian blog writes on Tarek's detention wondering why every time a Syrian citizen is detained for merely criticizing his nation's flaws, asserting that it's the people who eventually defend their nation:

هل من المعقول أن يسجن الإنسان كل هذه المدة من أجل كلمة تقال في حق الوطن ؟! عندما أنتقد الوطن والقائمين عليه ، هذا لا يعني أني لا أحبهم و لا أتمنى لهم الخير ، بل أنتقدهم لأني أريد أن يكون وطني مثالا يحتذى به في كل المجالات ، هؤلاء الشباب هم زهرة الأوطان ، هم الذين سيدافعون عن قضايا الأوطان ، و بهمتم العالية تبنى الأوطان ، فلماذا تنزع كرامة الشاب من أجل كلمة تقال ، إن كنا نعرف أن بعض كلمات ستودي بنا إلى السجن ، فسنوقف أقلامنا ، و نغلق أفواهنا ، و نقطع ألسنتنا ، و نجلس عبادا نساكا ننتظر رحمة الله و فرجه القريب

Is it possible to detain someone this long for having his say on his nation's affairs? When I criticize my nation and its leaders, it doesn't mean that I dislike them or wish them harm. I just do it to make my country better in all fields. Those youngsters are the nation's blossoms; they'll defend and protect the country, and with them we build it. So why are we stripping a man of his dignity for a word he said? If we knew that a few words would lead us to jail, we would stop writing, shut our mouths, cut our tongues and sit back as slaves waiting for God's mercy.

At the end of his post, the blogger draws our attention to important statistics:

ملاحظة : هناك 40 ألف قضية في قصر العدل لم تتطرق لها المحكمة بعد ، هذا ما أشارت إليه النائب العام غادة مراد في حديثها للجزيرة ضمن برنامج رائدات

Up to this moment, one Syrian human rights agency did report on Tarek's detention at the very day of his detention on 7-7-2007. HRW mentioned his name in its report on Syrian officials' continuous arrests of people over online comments:

On June 30, 2007, Military Intelligence in the coastal city of Tartous arrested Tarek Biasi, 22, because he “went online and insulted security services,” according to a person familiar with the case. Biasi remains in incommunicado detention, his whereabouts unknown.

The HRW report says Tarek was detained on June 30, but the Syrian human rights agency and his family and friends confirmed that Tarek was detained on the 7th. of July and not on June 30th. I am noting this issue for documentation purposes.

Tarek does not stand alone in these arrests policy over online comments, the HRW report lists seven names among those who've been detained for expressing their views online. This policy started in 2002 but it has been increasing recently and especially after the “Ministry of Telecommunications and Technology” circular; Sami Ben Gharbia wrote about the repression of internet in Syria and here he uncovers the circular's instructions:

Recently, the new-formed “Ministry of Telecommunications and Technology” issued a new circular asking the owners of the Syrian websites “to exercise accuracy and objectivity (…) and to post the name of the writer of an article and the one who comments on it in a clear and detailed manner.” The Ministry added that “the failure to do so would result in warning the website owner and rendering his website temporarily inaccessible. In case the violation is repeated, the website will become permanently inaccessible.

Here's my response to this circular.

It is not a secret that the Syrian tyrant regime is tight on the Syrian people and tighter on those who try to break through, but as I mentioned earlier in my blog there is no space on the ground for the youth to express their views or to embody their interests except on the cyber world. So what made li Zein al-`Abideen Mej`an, Karim ‘Arbaji (29), Tarek Biasi (22) and many others turn to the Internet? Isn't it the very absent tangible Syria? Among all of the people who live in Syria, the Syrian government is detaining those who actually care about the Syrian public affair, those who care about Syria; those who have opinions and express them online simply because they can’t express themselves elsewhere. So by detaining these people, the Syrian government is making one of its exquisite statements: “don’t even bother to think and have a say, we'll just do it for you”.

So there is no tangible Syria, and soon enough there might be no virtual Syria as well, I wonder how can there be Syrians without Syria, or Syria without Syrians who care.

Censorship in Syria is not a joke and it's shouldn’t be viewed as the “norm/typical/predictable policies” of the tyrannical Syrian government. We're not talking about the imprisonment of political activists anymore, not even human rights activists, we're talking about detaining people, just people like you and me, mostly students, whose mere accusation was having opinions, whether I agree with them or not, and mostly I don’t, is never the case, but the fact that someone who still cares and dares to express her/his views in Syria is not the norm, it's a rare case, and the detention of these rare people is very serious.

For those who are interested in helping Tarek and his family please send me and email at: arab.spring[at]gmail[dot]com.