A senior US military official warned Saturday of the threat of an ISIS "army" detained in Iraq and Syria, following a visit to prisons and camps where suspected jihadists and their relatives are held. "While visiting the detention center, I saw the imminent threat posed by this group of detained ISIS fighters," the head of the US military command for the Middle East (Centcom), Gen. Michael Kurilla, said in a statement.
He visited several detention centers this week, including Ghwayran in Hasakah, northeastern Syria, where hundreds of people were killed after jihadists stormed him in early 2022, according to the statement. "Between those detained in Syria and Iraq, there is a veritable IS army in detention. If released, this group would pose a great threat to the region and beyond," he said.
Very few repatriations
The Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and administrators at Ghwayran prison described the detainees as "unrepentant, likely to further radicalize ... and like a ticking time bomb," according to Centcom. The SDF, backed by a US-led international coalition, spearheaded the fight against IS, which was driven from its strongholds in Syria in 2019, after a meteoric rise in power in 2014 and the conquest of vast territories in that country and neighboring Iraq.
Tens of thousands of people, including relatives of jihadists, were detained in camps run by Kurdish forces in the following years. Despite repeated appeals from the Kurdish administration, most Western countries refuse to repatriate their citizens from these camps, content with drip repatriations for fear of possible terrorist acts on their soil.
- World
- Daesh
- Syria
- Iraq
- Jihadists
- USA