Story By:  Ana Marjanovic, Sub-Editor: Michael Leidig, Agency:  Newsflash

A Syrian doctor accused of torturing inmates at a government prison hospital has come face to face with one of his victims in a courtroom.

Alaa Mousa, 36, is said to have tortured and killed opponents of the state’s brutal dictator Bashar al-Assad, allegedly setting fire to one victim’s genitals.

Now Mousa – on trial in Frankfurt, Germany, for crimes against humanity – has had to face one of the inmates of the “slaughterhouse” hospital at Homs.

The 29-year-old witness says he saw first-hand Mousa administer a lethal injection into the arm of a fellow torture victim.

The prisoner was shaking and was dead within a few hours, the court heard.

The witness – a joint plaintiff in the case – described to the Higher Regional Court the abuse and torture he said he was subjected to from April to December 2012 in various prison facilities run by the Syrian state security and military.

The witness started by saying he recognised Mousa, who worked at the military hospital in Homs.

The witness had taken part in demonstrations against the Syrian government in his hometown in the Homs region.

He had just finished school and he was planning to study engineering. He said his family had “always” been against the Assad government.

The witness said he was arrested at a checkpoint in April 2012, when he was on his way to visit a relative.

He was first taken to a state security interrogation centre, where “I was tortured, of course…in the first few minutes”.

However, he said the torture there was “not so cruel” compared to his later treatment in military interrogation centres.

He was taken to the military hospital in Homs, where the accused worked as an assistant doctor in orthopaedics, following a rebellion in Homs central prison.

He said: “We were about 15 to 20 people. We had to line up, then there was the usual welcoming committee, beatings and insults.”

He said prisoners explained to the newcomers: “It’s not a hospital, it’s like a slaughterhouse.”

The witness said he endured nightmares and agony from his injuries for years and still suffers today.

Cruel Mousa was there when prisoners were taken out of their cells to be tortured, he explained.

The young man testified in court yesterday (Tuesday, 3rd May), and he will continue to give evidence this week.

Mousa has already admitted to working as an assistant doctor in military hospitals in Homs and Damascus, where he said he witnessed the mistreatment of prisoners.

He has also admitted to having heard screams from the rooms where detained patients were tied to their beds.

However, he has denied having tortured prisoners himself.

But prosecutors say the defendant personally tortured protesters against the Syrian government, causing them serious physical and mental damage, between April 2011 and the end of 2012 in the military hospital in Homs and in the prison of the secret police.

In one case, he is accused of killing a prisoner with an injection.

The trial continues.