Record Number of Islamic State Women, Children in Syrian Camps Repatriated to Home Countries

A record number of women and children who had gone to Syria to live in the Islamic State’s “caliphate” until 2019 and who have been living in detention camps run by Kurdish authorities and international NGOs have been repatriated in 2022, according to Kurdish authorities. Kurdish-led forces, backed by the United States, ejected Islamic State group fighters from their all of their territory in Syria in 2019. The women and children who fled those forced were housed in the detention camps, which are overcrowded and have led to serious violence and illness throughout the camps. The home countries of the women and their children – many born in the detention camps – have been reluctant to repatriate them due to fears that they were radicalized by the Islamic state – which could pose a security threat as well as lead to a public backlash, according to Reuters.  Some 517 women and children have been repatriated so far for 2022, to France Germany and Tajikistan, according to the report.  Another 324 were repatriated in 2021, 281 in 2020 and 342 in 2019. But more than 10,000 foreign women and children remain in the Al-Hol and Roj camps in northeast Syria, Reuters reported, citing unnamed senior Kurdish officials.