Britain has quietly repatriated ladies and youngsters linked to ISIS who had been held alongside Shamima Begum, a director of a Syrian camp has claimed.
At the least six ladies and 9 kids have been despatched again to Britain from camps held by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the Occasions reported.
They had been returned amid fears that ISIS prisoners held by the SDF could escape as chaos engulfs japanese Syria as the brand new Syrian authorities begins to reclaim territory from the SDF.
Up to now, the Kurdish-led SDF stays in charge of the al-Roj camp close to the Iraqi border, the place Begum and different British ladies had been held following ISIS demise.
Whereas the UK’s official coverage on repatriation has remained unchanged, the newspaper reported that the international workplace has allowed only a handful of girls to return on a case-by-case foundation.
Most of those that have been handed again to the UK had been ladies who had been taken to Syria after they had been simply kids.
A camp official instructed the Occasions {that a} additional 29 British ladies and youngsters stay within the al-Roj camp, which is about to be handed over to the Syrian authorities.
Management of one other, bigger camp – al-Hawl – has already been handed over to the Syrian authorities. However Jihan Hanan, who was the director of al-Hawl till this week, stated the method was messy and chaotic.
Britain has quietly repatriated ladies and youngsters linked to ISIS who had been held alongside Shamima Begum (pictured)
Girls stroll at Camp al-Roj, the place family members of individuals suspected of belonging to the Islamic State (IS) group are held, within the countryside close to al-Malikiyah (Derik) in Syria’s northeastern Hasakah province on October 8, 2023
Girls and youngsters seen inside al-Hawl camp, amongst them some 6,200 ladies and youngsters from round 40 nationalities, together with family members of suspected Islamic State jihadists within the desert area of Hasakah province in Al Hasakah, Syria, on January 25, 2026
The SDF pulled out its troops as Syrian authorities troops superior on them, resulting in main riots and dozens of ISIS-linked ladies escaping, with their whereabouts unknown.
Hanan stated: ‘There have been no preparations for the handover. I am trying on the movies and photos popping out and it burns my coronary heart.
‘The folks inside, the worldwide neighborhood’s indifference. On the finish of the day these are ladies and youngsters.’
Although the SDF has referred to as on nations to repatriate their residents, most have refused.
The US, at the moment debating whether or not to withdraw its forces from Syria, lately brokered a deal to switch male ISIS prisoners to neighbouring Iraq.
Hanan stated: ‘The worldwide neighborhood ought to say: “Sufficient, this matter must be resolved”.’
Throughout the 2010s, numerous ladies travelled or had been taken to Syria to affix ISIS. Begum was one in all three ladies from Bethnal Inexperienced, London, who left the UK in 2015.
The opposite two she travelled with are believed to have died amid preventing between ISIS jihadists and a Western coalition that set about ridding the area of the terrorist organisation.
Be part of the controversy
Does this example expose a failure of long-term UK counter-terror coverage?
Members of Syrian safety forces contained in the al-Hawl camp within the desert area of Hasakah province in Al Hasakah, Syria, on January 25, 2026
Management of al-Hawl has already been handed over to the Syrian authorities.
Following ISIS’s fall from energy, its prisoners had been held in camps beneath Kurdish guard.
There, ladies raised their kids in tents beneath ISIS’s extremist beliefs.
At these camps, boys who hit puberty had been pressured to sleep with older ladies to provide extra ‘lion cubs’ to bolster the caliphate’s numbers.
Reprieve, a human rights charity that represents international households detained within the camps, accused the UK of abandoning British residents in dire straits.
Maya Foa, chief government of the charity, stated: ‘Whereas all of our safety allies have a coverage of repatriating households, Britain has taken a ‘do nothing’ method.
‘Over two governments they’ve introduced residence only a handful of girls and youngsters — and there have been even fewer beneath this authorities than the earlier one.
‘This method is completely insufficient within the present second, when British households are at acute danger, in a harmful detention camp that might collapse at any time.
‘The US introduced its folks again way back and has urged Britain to do the identical. The place there are circumstances to reply, the adults could be prosecuted in British courts.’
