Take back your jihadis, Syrian forces tell Britain

Our country is not a landfill site for your filth, they say

From Larisa Brown, Middle East Correspondent in Kobane, Syria BRITISH jihadists captured in Syria should be taken back to face trial in the UK or be put before a new international court there, the forces holding them demanded last night.

Describing British citizens who fought for Islamic State as ‘filth’, they said Syria was not a ‘landfill’ site for foreigners considered a danger to their own nations. They also admitted jailed fighters, including two members of the notori- ous ‘ Beatles’ gang, are being treated better than refugees fleeing war because they have TVs and warm shelter.

Figures show there are six Britons among the 795 IS prisoners held in northern Syria. There are also more than a dozen British jihadi wives and children being held in two camps, out of a total of 584 women and 1,248 children from across the world.

Britain has so far refused to take any back, instead stripping them of citizenship to stop them returning. But senior Government sources believe there is enough evidence to achieve convictions in British courts on terror charges.

Mustafa Bali, of the Syrian Democratic Forces, one of the key alliances in the country’s civil war, said: ‘What we understand is that the Europeans think... the filth they had among them is out and they don’t want them back.

‘We don’t see our country as a landfill and we do not accept them. The compromise is to have a court here and the court can decide their fate.’

Speaking from the town of Kobane, where IS fighters carried out massacres, he said: ‘Foreign fighters were originally representing a danger to their societies.

‘ Then they came here and destroyed our cities and killed our people, so in one way or another, we had this war on behalf of Europe. It’s a moral responsibility for Europe to support this area.’

He argued that nations whose citizens were captured on the battlefields of Syria had ‘two options for the fate of the terrorists’. He explained: ‘Either each European country takes their citizens and prosecutes them in their homeland. Or, under the name of the EU or the UN, create an international court… and we can try them here.

‘If these courts are built, the fear of having those terrorists back in England will be gone as they will be put on trial here.’

He said out of 46 countries whose citizens fought for IS in Syria, only Russia and Indonesia had so far taken any back. Mr Bali dismissed suggestions that some of those captured were innocent and had gone to Syria to help victims of the war, saying: ‘We are capturing them from the frontlines where they fight. They are not innocent – they came to kill and destroy.’

He said jailed Londoners Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh – members of the murderous UK jihadi group known as the ‘Beatles’ – did not see Britain as home.

‘They told us, “It’s not our country and not our people – they are infidels”,’ he added. Nuri Mahmud, a spokesman for the Kurdish-led People’s Protection Units, also said the UK should ‘ either take them back or co-operate with us to solve the problem’.

Asked what Britain should do, he said: ‘They should take responsibility. It is global terrorism and they should be put on trial according to international law. Each country has to participate’.

He added the captured fighters were treated in accordance with international law, which meant they had a better life than the war’s refugees. He said: ‘ They have a warm place, TV, bathrooms and food three times a day.’