Amnesty International has warned of the nature of the conditions in which ISIS children live in Al-Hol camp in northeastern Syria, calling for the return of at least 27,000 children belonging to ISIS families from Syria, Iraq and more than 60 other countries..
The organization pointed out that these children suffer from horrific, deadly and inhuman conditions inside the camps, especially since they have been arbitrarily deprived for years of their freedom to impose restrictions on their movements inside the camp with the low level of livelihoods.
Amnesty International’s Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa, Lynn Maalouf, expressed her fear of the difficulty of accessing basic humanitarian aid to these children in the rehabilitation centers attached to the camps, stressing the importance of returning to their countries as the last opportunity to leave the camp..
Recently, international organizations have monitored the phenomenon of children dying inside al-Hol camp for many reasons, including murders. This year, 62 children died, an average of two children per week inside the camp..
Over the past months, France has repatriated about 35 children out of 320 who are in Syrian camps, while Britain has returned 4 out of 60 children, and Germany and Denmark have received about 36 children with their mothers, in addition to handing over 38 children to Azerbaijan and 79 children to Kyrgyzstan from camps in Iraq after UN appeals to the countries concerned to return their nationals without delay.
How do you become back?
Despite the acceleration of the pace of some countries’ recovery of numbers of ISIS children, the file remains a dilemma for the governments of those countries and the international community for nearly 3 years, due to the absence of international legislation regulating the process of receiving ISIS families, especially children..
The Director of the European Center for Counter-Terrorism and Intelligence Studies, Jassim Mohammed, believes that the task of returning these children from the camps to their homes is an “not easy” task that involves many challenges, especially since these children have been living since 2014 under the so-called “ISIS caliphate” and even after Their transfer to the camps after the announcement of the defeat of the organization in Iraq and Syria live in harsh conditions that lack the most basic rules for living, which increases their suffering and the difficulty of their return.
ISIS was the most recruiting organization for children, by opening schools and training camps in Iraq and Syria to teach them how to use weapons and undergo combat training to participate in battles, in addition to preparing curricula to plant violence and extremist ideas in their minds and exploit them to gather information, which increases European countries’ fears of recovering ISIS children.
According to UN estimates, about 40,000 children from 60 different foreign countries live in the two camps of al-Hol, most of whom are under the age of 12, including 20,000 children of Iraqi origin. About 12,000 children from ISIS families remain in camps and prisons in Iraq..
Trip hazards
With regard to the challenges that threaten the return of ISIS children to their countries, Jassim Muhammad explains that the risks are related to the fact that these children and their families still represent an obsession for their countries of origin, especially in the Syrian and Iraqi cities where the organization’s old strongholds are. ISIS.
He added, “Fears are multiplied in the western regions of Iraq, which are tribal in nature, the Syrian Badia desert, and the regions of northern and eastern Syria as well.”“.
On the other hand, returning children fears that they will be exposed to revenge and retaliation by the families of ISIS victims, which makes it a challenge for governments to avoid the consequences of returning ISIS children and reintegrating them into society on the one hand, and a psychological and social challenge for these young victims on the other hand, according to the director European Center.
ways to tackle
The United Nations seeks to lay global foundations for the process of returning ISIS children to their homeland, by launching a UN initiative, last September, that included providing integrated financial and technical support to meet the human rights and humanitarian needs of the returnees from the camps and camps of Iraq and Syria and to respond quickly to security and justice concerns in a manner that suits all ages of returning children. In addition to addressing the situation of the rest in the camps in a way that guarantees the restoration of states to them.
Regarding ways to address the risks of returning children, Muhammad points out that the European model in dealing with young returnees who belong to ISIS families is the best model so far, as it is necessary to separate the returnees involved in terrorist operations, especially since ISIS has mastered the recruitment of children and exploited them in carrying out suicide operations, and returnees not involved in terrorist crimes.
He stresses the importance of providing psychological support to children, as they are victims of ISIS and should not be blamed for their parents who committed war crimes, pointing to the role of rehabilitation programs and applications to reintegrate young people into societies again with the participation of civil society, clerics and the media to overcome the obstacle of forming new generations of terrorist organizations.
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