Syrian opposition politician Riyad Turk passed away in Paris at the age of 93. His daughter, Nasreen Turk, wrote on her Facebook account: "Goodbye my dear father Riyad Turk." Syrians and local media mourned Turk today, who is considered one of the most prominent individuals arrested by the Syrian regime since the 1960s.
Born in the early 1930s, opposition figure Riyad Turk studied law, and was only 22 when he was first arrested in 1952 on charges of belonging to the "Communist" party, remaining in detention for several months during which he was tortured. He faced imprisonment and torture on several occasions, leaving the country when the "Ba'ath Party" came to power in 1963, and returning in 1965. Turk was one of the prominent signatories of the "Damascus Declaration" issued in 2005 by a coalition of Syrian opposition groups calling for "democratic change" in Syria.
