These women and children were in camps in northeast Syria. In a press release, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced, Thursday, October 20, to have repatriated 40 children and 15 women detained in the country at war. “The miners were handed over [jeudi] to the child welfare services and will be subject to medical and social follow-up. The adults were handed over to the competent judicial authorities”said the Quai d’Orsay.
“France thanks the local authorities in northeast Syria for their cooperation, which made this operation possible,” the statement continues.
These women, aged 19 to 24, are among French women who had voluntarily traveled to territories controlled by jihadist groups in the Iraqi-Syrian zone and who were captured in the fall of the Islamic State in 2019.
“Three of them are the subject of an arrest warrant and will be presented to an investigating magistrate during the day”, detailed the national anti-terrorism prosecution in a press release. “The 12 others were placed in police custody in execution of a search warrant.
Of the miners, seven are orphans, the statement continued. They are “supported within the framework of educational assistance procedures under the responsibility of the public prosecutor’s office at the judicial court of Versailles.”
About 300 French minors who have stayed in areas where terrorist groups operate have returned to France, including 77 by repatriation, the Minister of Justice, Eric Dupond-Moretti, said in early October during a hearing before the Senate.
The Quai d’Orsay announced on July 5 the repatriation of 35 children and 16 mothers. A few hours later, the coordinator of intelligence and the fight against terrorism, Laurent Nunez, had declared that a hundred French women and nearly 250 French children were still held in Syrian camps.
Under pressure from the families of these jihadist women detained in particularly harsh conditions in prison camps, France has long carried out measured repatriations, decided on a case-by-case basis. But on September 14, the European Court of Human Rights, seized by the parents of two of these women, condemned France for not having properly studied these requests. After that, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it was ready to “consider” new repatriations whenever conditions permit.