No consensus on foreign fighters detained in Syria

OTTAWA: The fate of 700 foreign ighters detained in Syria as part of the Us-led campaign against Daesh militants will be up to each of their countries to decide, Canada’s defence minister said on Thursday.

The prisoners are being held by Arab-kurdish ighters from the Syrian Democratic Forces, which seized swaths of northern and eastern Syria from the Daesh in a months-long assault backed by Us-led coalition air support.

The detainees hail from some 40 countries, according to US Secretary of Defence James Mattis.

“Every nation will have to go through their own due process on this,” said Harjit Sajjan, speaking after a meeting of the coalition members in Chelsea, near the Canadian capital Ottawa.

He added that much investment had gone into ensuring their detention facilities were “in accordance with our standards.”

Coalition states are wary of bringing home nationals detained in the campaign because of dificulties in gathering evidence from a war zone and the threat of returning militants radicalising domestic inmates.

There is currently a demarcation line between areas controlled by the Us-led coalition battling Daesh militants, mainly in eastern Syria, and those controlled by Syria and its Russian allies in western Syria.

The Syrian regime and its allies dispute the legality of the coalition’s effective control of the north of the country, where there is a Kurdish majority, and are likely to challenge it.

Western nations say they want to “stabilise” the region to avoid a resurgence of Daesh and continue to ight its propaganda while attacking its militant networks. The aim of Thursday’s talks was to irm up those plans.

“There’s still work to be done,” said Mattis.

The coalition gathering brought together defence ministers and representatives from the top 13 military contributing nations known as the Restricted Group, which includes Australia, Britain, Canada, Germany and the United States.