5. Tadmor Military Prison
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gxSyHjPdmU&list=PL0XltMWyTXgqTL1Li1qxGzqX7KiuI9sEQ Location: Tadmur, Syria Once dubbed by Amnesty International as the most oppressive prison in the world, Tadmor has been designed to dehumanise its inmates in every aspect of prison life. The prison has no above ground access with the only entrance being a small tunnel underground. Once in, all inmates are tied up in heavy chains where they have nothing to look forward to except constant humiliation, beatings with metal rods and then being hung. In 1980 the then President Hafez al-Assad survived an assassination attempt. His response? Execute close to 1000 inmates in retaliation. Cleaning up the massacre took over two weeks. Tadmor was closed after the President's death in 2001 but his son, current President Basshir al-Assad, re-opened Tadmor in June 2011. It currently houses approximately 350 individuals whose only crime was to participate in anti-government protests.