In a video cited by Reuters, rebels can be seen firing at the lock of the gates of Saidnaya prison and firing more to open the locked doors leading to the cells. Men poured out in the corridor.
Other footage, which Reuters said was taken on the streets of Damascus, shows recently released prisoners running down the street.
In it, a passer-by is asked what happened.
“We overthrew the regime,” they answer, causing excited laughter from the former prisoner.
Of all the symbols of the repressive nature of the Assad regime, the network of prisons into which those who expressed any form of dissent disappeared cast the longest and darkest shadow.
In Saidnaya, torture, sexual violence and mass executions were the fate of thousands. Many never returned, and their families often did not know for years whether they were alive or dead.
One survivor of the ordeal, Omar al-Shogre, spoke to the BBC on Sunday about what he endured during his three years in prison as a teenager.
“I know the pain, I know the loneliness, and the hopelessness you feel because the world has let you suffer and has done nothing about it,” he said.
“They forced my cousin, whom I loved so much, to torture me, and they are forcing me to torture him. Otherwise, we will both be punished.”
