The Kurdish self-government in northern Syria claims to be contrary to the threat of US President Donald Trump detained foreign jihadists there not release. The Kurdish Foreign Affairs Commissioner Abdulkarim Omar told the „Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung“ („FAS“) that the 800 foreign prisoners are not in the hands of the US, but in Kurdish hands.
Therefore, Trump did not decide the fate of fighters of the jihadist militia Islamic State (IS). „We will deal with IS members in accordance with international treaties and conventions, and we will not release them,“ Omar told FAS. The Kurdish local government representative Ibrahim Murad told the newspaper, „We do not understand why Trump says so. What does he have to do with it? “
The foreign prisoners are a burden, but it is not in the Kurdish interest to release them. „That would be too dangerous for us,“ said Murad, according to the report.
„Like a ticking time bomb“
However, Kurdish politicians in Syria have been calling on western countries for months to take back their citizens captured in the civil war country. „These jihadists are like a ticking time bomb. If the bomb explodes, it is a danger for the whole world, not just for us, „quoted the“ FAS „the Kurdish representative in Berlin. The jihadists would have to be charged and convicted in their home countries, in northern Syria, there was not the necessary capacity.
Since December, tens of thousands of jihadists have fled the last IS bastion in eastern Syria and surrendered to the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). Among the prisoners are also many European jihadists with their wives and children.
