1. Searching for Syria’s disappeared
   

2025 was an incredibly painful year for so many families who continue to search for their loved ones after Assad’s network of prisons was opened with the fates of at least 112,000 Syrians still unknown.

In January, as families searched the prison system for any trace of information, not only was disinformation and misinformation rife but the international community and national authorities failed to protect vital evidence.

We moved fast to launch a new campaign urging international institutions and Syria’s interim authorities to urgently support a Syrian-led effort, involving families and survivors, to preserve evidence, investigate crimes and hold all perpetrators to account. We pressured bodies such as the ICRC and the UN, urging meaningful action. A petition built a strong body of support while new films of the families’ search underlined the urgency on social media. A short film on Mayasa’s search for her husband was viewed more than 50,000 times and Latifa Muhammad Sha’ban described her search to Al Jazeera. A podcast episode with human rights activist Hiba Breis tells the story of being reunited with her father who had endured detention.   

An open letter ​​to the Syrian authorities called for the tampering with prisons and mass graves to stop while meetings with international policymakers in Damascus and in capitals around the world all built the pressure on institutions and the authorities to act. 

The most powerful moments came when families shared their stories and expressed their demands, some for the very first time, at many gatherings and events throughout the year. 

On the anniversary of the revolution in March, close to 300 people stood together in the famous “March 18 Square” to remember their loved ones and remind the world that justice is yet to be done. The event, covered by Al Jazeera, DW, Megaphone and other media reinforced the power of survivors from different backgrounds and experiences, many of whom have not been able to raise their voice safely before. 

In June, Rania Najdi displayed her striking artwork at the national museum in Damascus and The Syria Campaign joined her to help bring families together for the exhibition and create a deeply moving space for connection. Even when the city’s electricity outage interrupted the event, families shared their experiences in darkness. 

Under a canopy of origami birds families of the disappeared met and shared their pain, hope and demands. Representatives of the Interim Government, the National Commission for Missing Persons, and the Independent Institution for Missing Persons in Syria listened to the families’ demands and the urgent need for collective and serious action.

Two months later for the International Day of the Disappeared, hundreds of families and people from around the world joined Rania and made their own origami birds in a powerful act of solidarity and call to action.

In collaboration with new emerging organisations, most notably Fig gardens and Truth Tents, we worked with families of Syria’s disappeared to plant trees in memory of those killed or missing and create spaces for community and shared healing. The events took place at a local level in diverse locations reaching families that might not have the means or ability to travel to Syria’s cities. We joined families to gather in Darayya, Yarmouk Camp, and Rukn al-Din. We helped families connect with government representatives to advocate directly and raised their cause to an international level through media coverage and social media stories. 

Many families told us that this was the first time they had even shared their stories, even with their neighbours, and that the events were vital for making sure they and their loved ones are not forgotten. Families empowered each other, learned from one another, and united around shared demands. 

On the international Day of the Disappeared, families gathered at Hijaz Square in Damascus to renew their demands for truth and justice, and to hold perpetrators accountable. Holding photos of their loved ones, they made origami birds to tell the whole world that the struggle for truth and justice is far from over, and that the interim authorities and international community must take action to answer their demands.

On the same day in the village of Heish, other families planted 120 olive and fig trees, each bearing the name of a loved one killed or disappeared.

In order to address a large funding gap for victim and family groups, The Syria Campaign’s supporters gave more than $15,000 to ADMSP and their work to help families and survivors in urgent need of psychological, medical, and legal support to continue their healing journey and struggle for justice. While we worked with philanthropic donors to provide emergency support to legal, documentation survivors and family groups working on the frontline of the search for truth and justice.

2. Campaigning for Syria’s stolen children 

Following an important investigation by Lighthouse Reports, revealing how, under Assad’s regime, children of detainees were taken from their parents and hidden in Assad’s dungeons or orphanages, we supported families searching for their children to build strong recommendations and meet with government authorities, following a screening of the film in Damascus. The first-ever event on this under-reported human rights abuse brought together families to share their stories and demands with decision makers. 

The moment was a vital first step in the urgent search for Syria’s stolen children, a campaign that will be a major priority for The Syria Campaign in 2026.

3. Speaking out against violence

When horrific killing and human rights abuses in Syria’s coastal areas at the beginning of March forced many families to flee their homes in fear for their lives, we responded rapidly with an urgent campaign to end the bloodshed. The sectarian nature of the attacks was fueled by online hate and incitement, threatening to destabilise peace efforts and justice and accountability processes.

We contacted policymakers to alert them of the crisis, sharing recommendations to act. We told the stories of survivors and first responders on social media and connected them to international media, helping to underline the responsibility of the international community and interim government to respond and the need for swift justice. In the month of March, we helped secure 591 pieces of media coverage including on the harmful real world consequences of disinformation. 

Four months after the violence began, in advance of the release of the interim government’s investigation into the massacres, we asked supporters to share a message from Hanadi Zahlout, a Syrian activist and journalist whose three brothers were killed in the violence.

Again, in July when more than 1000 civilians, including humanitarian workers, were killed by armed groups and 93,000 people displaced in Suweyda, we shared testimonies from human rights defenders who detailed the violence and humanitarian consequences of the government-imposed siege and shared an emergency advocacy brief with international policymakers.

As the situation worsened, there were growing fears that Syria was on the brink of civil war. We launched a petition urging the interim government and the UN to act, a call that was signed by more than 28,400 people. We highlighted the inspirational story of a choir singing for peace and helped secure high profile media attention for the situation, including Sky news, the BBC, The Observer, DW, and The Sunday Times.

At the end of the year at the time of writing, the situation remains fragile. Communities continue to live in fear and much more needs to be done to stop spiralling violence, deliver justice and protect the hard-won opportunity to rebuild the country after so many decades of war. It is vital, not just for the protection of civilians but also for transitional justice, ensuring crimes of the past are not repeated. 

 

4. The Silencing effect and the effect of silence

The Silencing Effect project took evidence from those with lived experience of online harms, including European social media users, directly to the EU commission to inform its implementation of the Digital Services Act.

Through thoughtful research, a visual human and data-driven report, a public campaign, policy events and EU advocacy, the project demonstrates the power of credible data backed up by personal testimony. 

The Syria Campaign, together with Data4Change and pollsters RIWI, surveyed more than 4,000 social media users across the UK, France and Germany and talked to human rights defenders from Palestine, Ukraine and Syria to discover why we’re self-censoring online and why it matters.

The Arabic version of the Silencing Effect launched in April on social media at a time when disinformation and hate speech in Syria was surging following sectarian violence in the coastal areas of the country. More than 1500 people took action by writing to the EU Commission urging it to do more to make our online world a safer place, while our Rightscon event examined the report and discussed solutions with the digital rights community and representatives from big tech.