HRW: Europe must repatriate Daesh inmates from Syria

On Tuesday, the New York-based NGO raised concerns about attempts by some European states to facilitate the transfer of Daesh inmates to Iraq for trial from prisons in the Kurdish-held northern regions of Syria as the Turkish offensive has increased the odds of a jailbreak there.

According to the Kurdish authority, around 12,000 Daesh suspects are held in jails across Syria’s northeast, some 2,500 of whom are non-Iraqi foreign nationals.

Recently, fears have grown that Daesh elements may escape from prisons in Syria as the Kurdish forces guarding them are diverting manpower to fend off the Turkish offensive.

HRW’s Iraq researcher Belkis Wille claimed that trials in Iraq were “inherently unfair and replete with due process violations,” urging Britain, Denmark, France, Germany and other countries to secure their citizens’ repatriation.

“Given Iraq’s record of unfair trials, European states should not promote efforts to have their nationals transferred there for prosecution,” she said.

Any government supporting such a move “without taking measures to remove the risk of torture, sham trials and execution risks contributing to serious abuses,” she added.

Turkey launched its military campaign, dubbed Operation Peace Spring, against the Kurdish militants controlling northeast Syria last Wednesday, just days after the US pulled its forces out of the region in what is widely viewed as Washington’s betrayal of its longtime Kurdish allies.

Ankara says the operation is meant to purge the Syrian region of the Kurdish militants, whom Turkey views as terrorists linked to local autonomy-seeking militants of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

Syrian troops enter three towns after deal with KurdsSyrian forces enter the towns of Tabqah, Ain Issa and Tel Tamer in the northeast following the government’s deal with Kurds to protect the region against an ongoing Turkish incursion.

Facing criticism, US President Donald Trump has suggested that Kurdish forces might be purposely allowing Daesh detainees to escape prisons to bait Washington into remaining involved in northeastern Syria.

“Kurds may be releasing some to get us involved,” Trump tweeted on Monday.

“Europe had a chance to get their ISIS (Daesh) prisoners, but didn’t want the cost. ‘Let the USA pay,’ they said…,” he added.

The European countries — which have been hit by numerous Takfiri-inspired terror attacks in recent years — have been unwilling to allow the return of their citizens suspected of having joined Daesh and other Takfiri outfits, viewing them as a security threat.

Extremists from across Europe joined Daesh in droves in 2014, when the Takfiri terror group launched its campaign of death and destruction before its collapse in late 2017.

European countries estimated that as many as 6,000 people traveled to the two Arab countries back then. About a third were killed, while another third remain detained in the region or have moved elsewhere.