Arabic version: السلطات تؤكد احتمال وفاة أطفال بطلة الشطرنج المفقودة
Syria’s National Commission for Missing Persons (NCMP) says the children of dentist and former chess champion Rania al‑Abbasi, who disappeared with their parents more than a decade ago under then-President Bashar al-Assad, are likely dead. This announcement follows their disappearance over a decade ago during a government raid in March 2013. According to Al Jazeera, the NCMP stated that they reached this conclusion with a high degree of professional certainty.
The children, aged three to 15 at the time of their disappearance, became emblematic of the plight faced by many families of missing persons under the regime of former President Bashar al-Assad, who was ousted in 2024. The NCMP was established by Syria’s new leadership in May 2025 to investigate cases of missing and forcibly disappeared individuals.
Rania al-Abbasi and her husband, Abdul Rahman Yasin, vanished alongside their six children during a government raid in Damascus. The commission mentioned that its findings were based on multiple verification and analysis procedures, and it confirmed that efforts to locate the remains of the children are still ongoing.
Hassan al-Abbasi, Rania’s brother, confirmed the tragic news in a Facebook video, stating that the family had seen video evidence linked to a suspect in a 2013 massacre, which included footage of children accused of terrorism. “They turned out to be our children,” he said. “We finally saw them … but they were martyred.”
The fate of Rania and her husband remains officially unknown, with rights groups suggesting they may have died while in custody, although their bodies have never been found. The issue of missing persons continues to be a significant concern in Syria, with estimates suggesting that over 300,000 individuals may have gone missing during decades of al-Assad family rule. Additionally, the Syrian Ministry of Interior has reported evidence linking a notorious figure from the Assad regime to the children’s deaths, further complicating the ongoing investigation.
