The director of a Syrian detention camp housing over 2,000 people with links to Islamic State has reported increasingly hostile behaviour from residents following a government offensive that weakened Kurdish-led security forces.
Hakmiyeh Ibrahim, who oversees the Roj camp near the Iraqi border, stated that camp residents have become emboldened, telling guards they will soon be free whilst Kurdish personnel will be imprisoned instead. The shift in attitude followed territorial gains by Syrian government forces against the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces earlier this month.
More than 2,300 individuals are housed at Roj, predominantly women and children who have been detained for nearly a decade. The facility contains 742 families from nearly 50 countries, with the bulk originating from former Soviet Union states, alongside smaller numbers of Syrians and Iraqis.
Some residents are drawing comparisons between their situation and that of Syria’s interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa, formerly known by his nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Golani. His group was once linked to al-Qaida before becoming rivals with IS, and he has since joined the global coalition against Islamic State after being removed from UN and US terrorist lists.
A Tunisian woman identifying herself as Buthaina told journalists: “People used to say that al-Golani was the biggest terrorist. What happened to him later? He became the president of Syria. He is not a terrorist any more.” She argued the international community should extend similar treatment to camp residents.
The government offensive this month captured most territory previously held by Kurdish forces, including the significantly larger al-Hol camp, which houses nearly 24,000 mostly women and children linked to IS. Many detainees are either wives or widows of fighters defeated in Syria in March 2019.
Ibrahim noted the changes extended beyond verbal confrontations. “There were changes in the behaviour of children and women. They became more hostile,” the director stated, adding the developments gave residents “hope that the Islamic State group is coming back strongly.”
Interviews with camp residents revealed mixed intentions regarding their future. A German woman identifying herself as Aysha stated her intention to remain in Syria, describing Germany as “all infidels”. Conversely, a Belgian woman named Cassandra expressed desire to leave the camp but stay in Kurdish-controlled areas of Syria.
Human rights organisations have criticised international inaction on the camps for years. Beatrice Eriksson, cofounder of Repatriate the Children in Sweden, characterised current events as “exactly what we have been warning about for years” and described the camps’ continued existence as “a political decision” rather than an unfortunate conflict by-product.
Most countries have proven unwilling to repatriate their citizens from the facilities. The US military has begun transferring male IS detainees from Syrian prisons to Iraqi detention centres, but no clear plan exists for repatriating women and children from Roj.
The government advance led to chaos at detention centres holding nearly 9,000 IS members. Syrian forces now control facilities including al-Aqtan prison near Raqqa and Shaddadeh prison near Iraq, where over 120 detainees fled before most were recaptured.
An initial ceasefire agreement between Damascus and the SDF included provisions for the Kurdish-led group to hand over camp and detention centre management to Syrian authorities, though implementation details remain unclear.
