Concerns increase for TT children held in ISIS camps

FRESH violence inside a Syrian camp, where some children from TT have been living, has sparked new fears.

On Friday, Newsday was told that close to where a few TT mothers and their children are holed up in the al-Hol camp, a 25-year-old woman from Iraq was attacked with a hammer.

A journalist at the camp, tweeting under the name “Caki,” posted that the attack happened inside the camp on the Kurdish border on Thursday night. Women and children were forced to flee.

The Middle East Eye, an online newspaper, reported that photos have emerged showing the unhealthy conditions in the Kurdish-run camp. A photo of a child asleep, with flies around his mouth and eyes, carries a caption that reads, “One of the Trinidadian children at al-Hol camp whom relatives are trying to bring home.”

Describing the conditions children live in, the story said the tents smell of stale sweat, prison grime “and something that could be the death of hope.”

There is hardly any food and water on the hot, deserted border and flies fester in toilets dug into bare ground have taken over the camps, the report added. Local activists have been lobbying for Government to find the children and return them to TT.

According to reports, between 2014 and 2016, approximately 130 men, women and children migrated to Syria and Iraq to join the Islamic State (ISIS). Reports said most of the men were killed in battle with international coalition forces while the women and children were captured and put in refugee camps.

The Anjuman Sunnat-ul-Jamaat Association (ASJA) discussed the plight of the children and their mothers recently.

ASJA vice-president Zainool Sarafat, told Newsday, “We discussed the matter. It is something we think needs to be addressed. When the president (Yacoob Ali) returns, we will issue a statement.” Ali is in Canada.

Islamic Front leader Umar Abdullah, in a release, renewed the call for repatriation, saying the children, especially, were innocently caught in the turmoil.

“The women said they feared that devastating things can happen to their families, including children, unless the Government of TT act.” Abdullah said he supports the view that the mothers who took their children to war-torn Syria and Iraq should be questioned.

“I’m for repatriation of women and children – but there has to be a reckoning with some of the women who knowingly took their kids to a war zone.” He added, “They (women) are not victims. The kids are, but not the parents.”