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Monday, July 21, 2025

Human Rights Watch warns: T&T children can be radicalised in Syria

by

Otto Carrington
853 days ago
20230320
Human rights advocate Jo Becker

Human rights advocate Jo Becker

ABRAHAM DIAZ

There are con­cerns that T&T na­tion­als de­tained in Syr­ia can be rad­i­calised. More than 100 T&T na­tion­als, in­clud­ing 56 chil­dren, are cur­rent­ly in prison or de­tained in refugee camps af­ter join­ing the Is­lam­ic State in Syr­ia and Iraq.

New in­for­ma­tion re­ceived through Hu­man Rights Watch sug­gests that chil­dren are now tar­gets of Is­lam­ic rad­i­cal groups in the camps.

Jo Beck­er, Ad­vo­ca­cy Di­rec­tor of the Chil­dren’s Rights Di­vi­sion at Hu­man Rights Watch, said while there is no spe­cif­ic in­for­ma­tion about Trinida­di­ans be­ing tar­get­ed by ISIS, “in­ter­na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty ex­perts agree that the longer na­tion­als stay in the re­gion, the greater the risk of in­doc­tri­na­tion and re­cruit­ment.”

US mil­i­tary ex­perts have called al-Hol, the big­ger of the two refugee camps, a cen­tre for child re­cruit­ment by ISIS. Dan­ish in­tel­li­gence sources have said that dozens of for­eign chil­dren have been smug­gled out of the camp specif­i­cal­ly for train­ing pur­pos­es, she told Guardian Me­dia.

“And oth­er ex­perts have called it a breed­ing ground for, you know, fu­ture ISIS fight­ers. So, you know, I think the im­por­tant thing is to bring back all for­eign na­tion­als as soon as pos­si­ble,” Beck­er fur­ther re­vealed.

Hu­man Rights Watch has called on the Gov­ern­ment to in­ter­vene and as­sist T&T na­tion­als de­tained in refugee camps.

Beck­er said, “Most of the Trinida­di­ans are in Roj, which is a small­er camp. But, you know, we know that ISIS loy­al­ists are ac­tive in both camps and as the months and years have gone by, some of these loy­al­ists have be­come en­gaged in high­er lev­els of vi­o­lence ... against oth­er de­tainees, against camp of­fi­cials, against hu­man­i­tar­i­an work­ers.

“And we al­so know that in some cas­es, they are tar­get­ing chil­dren in par­tic­u­lar for in­doc­tri­na­tion and rad­i­cal­i­sa­tion. So the great­est risk is leav­ing na­tion­als in the camps, not bring­ing them home.”

Of­fi­cials of Hu­man Rights Watch have met with T&T na­tion­als de­tained in Syr­ia.

“We know from our in­ter­views with women and chil­dren and oth­er de­tainees is that the thing that they want more than any­thing else is just to go home and re­sume a nor­mal life,” Beck­er said.

“You know, the chil­dren need to be back in school, peo­ple want to be back with fam­i­ly, get jobs and just re­join their com­mu­ni­ty. I know that of­fi­cials in Trinidad and To­ba­go are con­cerned about na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty. Of course, every gov­ern­ment needs to be con­cerned about na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty but it’s al­so im­por­tant to note that 38 oth­er coun­tries have al­ready repa­tri­at­ed some or many of their na­tion­als.

“That’s over 6,000 in­di­vid­u­als, many women and chil­dren, and we’ve not seen any in­crease in crime in those coun­tries as a re­sult. And we re­al­ly hope that the gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go acts quick­ly to bring their na­tion­als home.”

Beck­er added, “We’re con­tin­u­ing to high­light the dire hu­man­i­tar­i­an con­di­tion in the camps. We should note that this week we are en­ter­ing the fifth year of de­ten­tion for many of these for­eign na­tion­als. They’ve been lan­guish­ing there for a long time and as this an­niver­sary pass­es, it re­al­ly un­der­scores the ur­gency to act.

“I would al­so say that, you know, in the last few months we have been en­cour­aged that an in­creas­ing num­ber...of coun­tries have be­gun or have es­ca­lat­ed their repa­tri­a­tions. Over 10 gov­ern­ments, just since Oc­to­ber, have brought na­tion­als back. So, you know, we are con­tin­u­ing to en­gage with gov­ern­ments, a range of gov­ern­ments that have na­tion­als in the camps.

“We con­tin­ue to en­cour­age them to act quick­ly and we are con­tin­u­ing to mon­i­tor con­di­tions in the camps and the hu­man­i­tar­i­an con­di­tion there, which is quite dire. So we hope ac­tion will be com­ing quick­ly.”

Since the re­lease of a Hu­man Rights Watch re­port on T&T na­tion­als de­tained in Syr­ia and Iraq, many lo­cal Is­lam­ic Groups have been call­ing on the Gov­ern­ment to as­sist in re­turn­ing them to this coun­try.


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