A new investigation by Lighthouse Reports, with a coalition of six Syrian and international media, reveals how a major EU and UK-funded childcare charity, SOS Children’s Villages, held children in orphanages to extort their parents. Under Bashar al-Assad’s rule, Syrian state authorities systematically removed hundreds of children from parents detained on political grounds and placed them in orphanages—some run by SOS Children’s Villages—for purposes of coercion and control. The investigation built a database of over 300 confirmed cases, while families and whistleblowers estimate thousands more remain missing. Many arrested children were infants or toddlers; in some cases identities were falsified, records lost or altered, family contact forbidden, and reunification denied. SOS has been accused of complicity—allegedly continuing to accept children from intelligence services until 2022, appointing senior staff with regime ties, and failing to disclose or act on whistleblower warnings.