The 13 Syrian men and women named 17 suspects they considered "most responsible for Assad's brutal policies of repression", said non-profit legal organisation the European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR).
The latest complaint in Europe seeking international arrest warrants was filed under the principle of universal jurisdiction, which allows German courts to handle cases where neither the victims nor the perpetrators are German citizens.
Among the accused are top officials of Syria's National Security Bureau, Air Force Intelligence Directorate, defence ministry and military police.
"It's not just about me, it's about all those who are still being held in Assad's torture prisons."
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Awad said he was arrested for anti-regime activism in November 2011 with three friends and, while in custody, beaten with cables and nail-studded sticks by guards who also broke his jaw.
"I can still hear their voices now, their screams," he told AFP about his fellow inmates, his voice shaking. "I can hear the sound of the hits on their bodies".
Shappal Ibrahim, 40, who said he was held for one-and-a- half years at the Saydnaya military prison, said he wanted "to help ensure that the German authorities issue arrest warrants for the people responsible".
The Syrian Kurd and father of four told AFP in fluent German that in captivity he suffered "beatings without interruption for three to four hours" at a time and was also tormented with electric shocks.
"We were naked when it was very cold, we had almost nothing to eat, we were sometimes deprived of water for three days, and we were blindfolded," said Ibrahim, who claimed he lost nearly half his weight during his detention.
Rights group Amnesty International has accused the Assad regime of carrying out up to 13,000 hangings in five years in the prison.
More than 330,000 people have been killed and millions displaced in the six-year-old war between the Assad regime, backed by Russia and Iran, and rebels who have been supported by Turkey and other countries.
German and French prosecutors are already looking into claims of torture committed under Assad since 2011.
In an earlier case in Germany last March, seven Syrian torture survivors backed by the same initiative filed a complaint seeking international arrest warrants against six Syrian secret service officials.
According to witness testimony, the prisoners were beaten with pipes, sticks and meat hooks on chains, given electric shocks, burnt with cleaning chemicals and stabbed with pencils.
The ECCHR's Wolfgang Kaleck said the legal complaints might yield results years down the road, citing the case of Chile's 1973-90 dictator Augusto Pinochet.