Municipal Stadium Prison Point 11

The construction of Malaab al-Baladi (The Municipal Stadium) in Raqqa started in 1995. It was built on a piece of land that had been reserved for such activity since the 1970s. Crossing both the Firdous and Badou neighborhoods, the building was only completed in 2006. During its construction, the city of Raqqa expanded significantly. The stadium, which was once on the outskirts of the city, became part of the city center.

Over the years, the cement wall surrounding the stadium became dirty, earning it the nickname of ‘The Black Stadium’ by residents. This name became even more poignant after ISIS converted it into a prison. The prison was also known locally as Point 11 Prison. It was the biggest and most brutal of all ISIS prisons. ISIS were not the first to use the premises as a prison. Earlier in 2013, before ISIS took over, Islamist militias established both a sharia committee and a prison in the building. ISIS, however, designated it for use as a detention center for ‘high security’ prisoners. The ISIS Prisons Museum (IPM) team started documenting and studying the Stadium Prison just days after ISIS had abandoned it. Over the years, the team has recorded 11 interviews with former detainees. The team has also interviewed engineers who worked on the construction of the stadium and activists who witnessed the establishment of the sharia committee before ISIS. The team has also recorded a series of interviews with a former ISIS member who performed administrative and logistical tasks at the prison. These interviews provide a clearer picture of both the prison and the changes it underwent before, during, and after ISIS control. The information gathered by the team indicates that the stadium housed two security branches, one for the province of Raqqa and another for other areas of Syria controlled by ISIS. Due to a lack of information, it was not possible to understand how the two branches cooperated or to distinguish between the two within the prison. There were around 46 rooms in the prison, including bathrooms, kitchens, group cells, solitary cells and rooms for the sharia judges. It also included rooms for executions, torture, prisoners’ belongings, and interrogation. Since ISIS considered the charges brought against prisoners here to be very serious, they faced extremely brutal torture which included hanging on a hoist by their limbs, nail pulling, and the skinning of body parts. After repeated airstrikes and escape attempts by the prisoners, ISIS transferred the detainees to other prisons. However, ISIS did not abandon the building. ISIS fighters barricaded themselves inside the stadium until they were finally expelled from Raqqa on Tuesday 17 October 2017. The stadium was the last ISIS base in the city. In the 3D tour, you can see holes and trenches dug by ISIS in some of the halls during their final battles. Since then, the stadium has been renovated and is once again used as a sports complex by the people of Raqqa. The building and the city are under the control of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).