French grandmothers sue for return of Isil orphans

THE grandmothers of two orphaned children of French jihadists held in camps in Syria are suing the French state for failing to bring them over to France, their lawyer said yesterday.

A girl aged five and a two-year-old boy are in the care of a Kurdish militia at the Roj camp in Al Hasakah, Syria, according to Samia Maktouf.

“They are in real danger without more international military protection,” said Ms Maktouf, who has represented the families of people killed in terror attacks in France including the 2015 Bataclan atrocity.

“These children, born under terror, should not undergo further suffering. France has a duty to protect them.”

The boy’s mother was 14 when she travelled to the then Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) stronghold of Raqqa, in Syria, in 2014.

Radicalised online, she died last year during the bombing of Raqqa by Usled coalition forces.

The child’s father is described as a European convert to Islam, and is said to have died after being detained in Iraq.

Ms Maktouf said she will argue in court that France has a duty of care towards the two orphans because it is a signatory to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. No date has been set for a court hearing so far.

She said the children, who are eligible for French citizenship, could be in danger from further fighting.

Plans to repatriate French jihadists and their children have raised huge public opposition. An opinion poll last week suggested that 82 per cent of French people think they should be left in camps and tried in Iraq.

Many believe there can be no extenuating circumstances for those who joined terrorist groups and there should be no leniency for their wives or children. About 100 French children are now being held in camps in Syria controlled by Kurdish militia.

Meanwhile, it was confirmed that two brothers, among France’s bestknown jihadists, have been killed in Isil’s last-remaining pocket in Syria.

Fabien Clain, 41, recorded the sixminute audio clip in which Isil claimed responsibility for the Paris attacks in November 2015 while his brother Jeanmichel, 38, provided a religious chant for the recording.