Warning that children will be radicalised if left in Syrian camps

CHILDREN of foreign Isil members risk becoming the next generation of jihadists if they are left in Syria, a senior Kurdish official has warned.

Unrepentant parents, such as Shamima Begum, could radicalise their children in sprawling Syrian desert camps, where security forces could lose track of them, claimed Ilham Ahmed, co-chairman of the Syrian Democratic Council, the political wing of the Syrian Democratic Forces.

Britain must repatriate citizens who travelled to Syria or be prepared to commit “significant” resources to detaining them there, she told The Daily Telegraph.

“Them remaining in our area is a huge liability. We have fulfilled our duties. We have captured them and we have held them. We are now making sure they don’t escape,” Ms Ahmed said. “Here in the West you have all the opportunities to try them. You have courts, you have laws, you have prisons.”

About 4,000 women and children from Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) families are currently being held in camps by the SDF including Ms Begum, the 19-year-old from Bethnal Green who has said she has no regrets about joining the terror group.

Ms Ahmad, one of several senior Kurdish leaders taking part in a diplomatic blitz to convince Western governments not to abandon the SDF when the battle against Isil ends, said Ms Begum’s attitude was typical of many detainees.

“The majority of them say that they don’t have any regrets. And you can see that in the way they raise their children: they raise them in the ideology of Isil, and they still think that ideology is correct,” she said in an interview in London. “That’s why it is not just enough to take these people back. They also need to be treated. The children, they need special care. So do the mothers.”

Donald Trump last week called on European governments to repatriate an estimated 800 foreign members of Isil taken prisoner in Syria. But Theresa May’s spokesman rebuffed the US suggestion yesterday, saying the fighters should be put on trial in places where they committed their crimes.

“Foreign fighters should be brought to justice in accordance with due legal process in the most appropriate jurisdiction,” Downing Street said. “Where possible, this should be in the region where the crimes had been committed.”