Kurdish authorities in north-eastern Syria have handed over four wives of ISIS members and 10 children to a Canadian delegation for their repatriation, officials said. Western governments have been increasingly criticised for not taking back more of their citizens who travelled to Iraq and Syria to volunteer for ISIS. Thousands of foreign women and children remain in overcrowded displaced people's camps in Kurdish-administered north-eastern Syria where they are vulnerable to indoctrination. Khaled Ibrahim, an official in the Kurdish administration, said the women and children who were living in the Roj camp were handed over to representatives of the Canadian Foreign Ministry. He said the women were aged between 26 and 35, while the children were between three and 11. It was the fourth repatriation carried out by Canada from the overcrowded camp, Mr Ibrahim said. The US State Department thanked the Syrian Democratic Forces for their leadership in addressing the "complicated situation". "The United States supported Canada’s repatriation today and stands ready to assist other nations in their repatriation efforts," State Department spokesman Vedant Patel said. On January 21, a Canadian federal court ordered the government to repatriate 23 citizens, 19 of them women and children, from the Roj and Al Hol camps, without setting a date. Earlier, the government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had treated ISIS family members in Syria on a case-by-case basis, and in four years only a handful of women and children had been repatriated. On Thursday, the Canadian government confirmed the latest repatriation. "As long as conditions allow, we will continue this work," the Foreign Ministry said. "Amidst reports of deteriorating conditions in the camps in north-eastern Syria, we have been particularly concerned about the health and well-being of Canadian children."
