More than 600 families returned from Al-Hol camp in Iraq in 9 batches over two years.
Here are the highlights of Al-Araji’s new statements on the Al-Hol camp:
We need to communicate with some tribal sheikhs and personalities in some cities who still have a strict vision regarding the return of families from al-Hol camp. We are optimistic and we have an integrated team that includes senior clan personalities, to overcome obstacles to the return of families and maintain civil peace. There is international support to end the case of Al-Hawl camp, and we thank the efforts made by the United Nations and some countries, but we need more support in this regard, because we have almost 7 000 families in the Al-Hawl camp, and it takes a long time, which poses a serious threat to our country and to the international community as a whole. There is a specialized team to search for kidnapped women inside the Al-Hol camp, and we are facing a problem not to disclose their identity for fear for their lives, but we have been able to reach some women and they were transferred to Iraq. Al-Hol camp is a security camp with distinction, in which there are about 7,000,000 Iraqi families, about that number of Syrians and more than 10,000 foreigners. It is 13 kilometers from the Iraqi border and is affiliated with the United Nations. It is a ticking time bomb for us, but that does not mean that we have to get out of it. It is our duty to eliminate the vestiges of terrorism. The government seeks to protect all Iraqis, and its decision was brave to receive families from Al-Hawl camp, where 9 batches have returned to their areas of origin so far, and there is an Iraqi team of all ministries and specialized government institutions working to integrate these families into society, and we continue to do so and we will not back down from this in order to preserve what has been acquired in terms of security. All those who are wanted will go before the Iraqi courts. As for children, women and those who interact with the social integration programme, they will return to their regions. There are 600 Iraqi families who have returned to their areas, and we have not recorded any indications of security from these families. The government has drawn up a program to rescue Iraqi children. Anyone who has committed a crime against Iraqis, their place is justice and imprisonment, and anyone who has been implicated, enticed and victimized due to being in a terrorist family, the government is working hard to resolve this matter.
The return of families from the Al-Hol camp between reception and reservation
Experts and observers believe that the dismantling of al-Hol camp, which is one of the most important remnants of IS, requires concerted international and Iraqi efforts, and that the return of more than 30,000 Iraqis , including a large number of ISIS members and their families, is a very complex and time-consuming process challenge, and requires strict and professional review plans and mechanisms.
Other analysts say accommodating Iraqis with terror, especially women and children, and rehabilitating and integrating them into society, is a wise government approach to solving a problem that affects dozens. of thousands of citizens, and necessary to bring down the curtain on the final chapters of the ISIS era.
Regarding the significance of the Iraqi decision announced by the National Security Advisor, writer and political analyst Ali Al-Baydar said in an interview with “Sky News Arabia”: “It is an important indication of the Baghdad’s effort to settle this thorny issue, which has constituted a change in its approach to this subject, considering that the Iraqis are horrified, in particular the women and children, as victims, and that they should not all be perpetrators and involved in terrorism.
In turn, security researcher Raad Hashim said, in a statement to “Sky News Arabia”, that “the return of these families undoubtedly requires integration between Iraqi and international efforts, to defuse this time bomb for about 8 years, as an urgent necessity for the security of Iraq, the region and the world as a whole.”
He explained that “despite the seriousness with which Iraq and the United Nations seek to put an end to this file, there are countries whose positions on the problem of the camps are characterized by ambiguity and lack of clarity, by evasion and procrastination in receiving their citizens from those who reside there.”
He underlined: “The issue is complicated and requires careful examination, because there are some of these Iraqi families whose hands are stained with blood, and they are involved in terrorism and carry a dangerous takfiri ideology, and for this reason their integration into Iraqi society is very difficult, regardless of the degrees and levels of their involvement in the organization.”
Hashim concluded his speech by saying, “We don’t have specialized institutions to rehabilitate these families and show whether they have already been freed from the criminal intellectual and behavioral contamination of ISIS or not, and for this reason there is usually a societal rejection of their return. and their non-acceptance, as we have seen, for example, in the governorates of Nineveh and Salah.
Al-Hol camp .. the largest “prison” for the detention of the Islamic State
The camp is home to between 55 and 60,000 people, mostly women and children, who have been displaced by the wars in Iraq and Syria and the war against ISIS, and almost half of them are Iraqis and a quarter of them are Syrians, while around 10,000 foreigners are housed in a secure annex, and many still are. In the camp, he is a strong supporter of the Islamic State. According to data from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 90% of the inhabitants of the Al-Hol camp are women and children. The history of the establishment of Al-Hol camp dates back to the 90s of the last century, when the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees established a camp on the outskirts of the city of Al-Hol, in eastern Syria, near the border with Iraq, and in coordination with Damascus, to receive thousands of displaced Iraqis and refugees after the second Gulf War. After the emergence of ISIS and its control since 2014 over large areas of Iraq and Syria, including the city of Al-Hol itself, which was liberated by the Syrian Democratic Forces with the aid from the International Coalition against the Islamic State in 2015, the displacement movement became active again, especially from the governorate of Nineveh and its center is the city of Mosul in northern Iraq, to be crowded with dozens of thousands of Iraqi refugees and displaced Syrians, and it is now the largest place of detention for ISIS and their families in the world.
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