France repatriates 35 ISIS-affiliated women and children from Syria

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – France on Tuesday said it had carried out an operation to return 25 children and 10 adult women from northeast Syria.

“Minors are handed over to the services responsible for child welfare and are subject to medico-social monitoring. Adults are handed over to the competent judicial authorities,” the French Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

Moreover, France thanked the local Autonomous Administration in Northeast Syria (AANES), “which made this operation possible.”

The AANES’s Department of External Relations confirmed in a statement that the Autonomous Administration in Northeast Syria (AANES) handed over ISIS families to a French delegation on Monday, after a contract was signed by both parties.

The delegation was led by Stéphane Romatet, head of the crisis management and support center of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Local officials warned that ongoing Turkish drone strikes undermine the fight against ISIS, including a recent drone strike that killed the co-chair of the Qamishlo Canton along with her deputy and driver.

Romatet also discussed a mechanism to support local communities in northeast Syria and the security conditions in their camps that host thousands of local and foreign ISIS families. Romatet then acknowledged the extreme burden these factors place on the local administrations.

Read More: France repatriates 16 women and 35 children of ISIS families from Syria

Also last year, French authorities repatriated 16 women and 35 children from northeast Syria.

The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the civilian AANES have consistently urged foreign nations to bring back their stranded nationals from Syria.

US State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller on June 30 also underlined that “repatriation is the only durable solution” for the approximately 10,000 people, most of whom are vulnerable children under the age of 12 from more than 60 countries, remaining in the al-Hol and Roj displaced persons camps in northeast Syria. 

He also welcomed Denmark’s repatriation of 1 woman and 2 children from displaced persons camps in northeast Syria.