Orphans first, UK strategy to return Daesh children

Shaimaa Hefzy

British authorities have begun to take serious steps to deal with Daesh children held in Syria, particularly orphans, which reveals the UK’s strategy to deal with returnees from conflict territories and their children.

Three British Daesh children in Syria were rescued by the UK in a daring Special Forces mission, The Sun reported.

On Friday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said that the children’s repatriation had been “a great success,” but he cautioned that it would be “over-optimistic to say that we could do it in every single case.”

The British foreign minister, Dominic Raab, said in October that “unaccompanied minors or orphans” who were caught up in the fighting in Syria could be returned to Britain “assuming they would not represent a security threat.”

On Thursday, Mr. Raab said that repatriating such children “was the right thing to do.”

“These innocent, orphaned, children should never have been subjected to the horrors of war,” Mr. Raab said in a statement. “Now they must be allowed the privacy and given the support to return to a normal life.”

A Kurdish diplomat named Dr Abdulkarim Omar wrote on Twitter, “Three British children from Daesh parents were handed over to a delegation representing the British Foreign Ministry.”

The Telegraph has reported that at least seven British men, 25 British women and more than 60 children are being held by the West-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and more than three-quarters of the British children are aged under five.

In a previous Commons debate in October, former Brexit secretary David Davis said vulnerable British children risked “turning into terrorists” if they were not brought home from Syria.

Mr Davis told MPs that three of the estimated 60 British children thought to be in the region were orphans, adding that those who had not been orphaned “still deserve the United Kingdom’s protection”.

Alison Griffin, head of humanitarian campaigns at Save The Children, said the Government “is transforming the lives of these innocent children who have been through terrible things that are far beyond their control”.

She added, “They will now have the precious chance to recover, have happy childhoods and live full lives. We should be proud of everyone who has worked to make this happen.

“Every child saved is a triumph of compassion in the face of cruelty. We fervently hope this is just the start.”

On the other hand, Britain refuses to allow the children of British Daesh members to return to the UK because of fears that their mothers will take advantage of the situation to return to the country, especially as Britain classifies female Daesh members as dangerous as males.