India, Sept. 18 -- A former Syrian military official convicted of torturing prisoners during the rule of former President Bashar Assad has been sentenced to 60 years in a US prison.

A federal judge in Los Angeles sentenced Samir Ousman Alsheikh on Thursday. A jury found him guilty in March of one count of conspiracy to commit torture and three counts of torture while in charge of Syria's infamous Adra Prison from roughly 2005 to 2008.

"The conduct was heinous, unimaginably cruel, and almost unspeakably violent and brutal," the judge said before announcing the sentence.

Human rights groups and United Nations officials have accused the Syrian government of widespread abuses in its detention facilities, including torture and arbitrary det...