[PULSE.NG] Children raised in the Islamic State...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling
Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not
reallyMoslems....
group's "caliphate" should not be treated as terrorists, the United Nations
...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks...
' Children Fund (UNICEF) warned Monday.
The agency's Middle East director said the fate of children whose jihadist families recently fled IS's last bastion in northeastern Syria should not be ignored.
"The message that these children are not wanted is growing stronger and stronger," Geert Cappelaere said at a presser in Beirut.
According to UNICEF, an estimated 3,000 foreign children are currently housed at the al-Hol camp which has taken in most of the massive influx of people fleeing the scrap of the IS "caliphate" in recent weeks.
They originate from at least 43 different countries, many of which have been reluctant to tackle the issue of their possible repatriation.
There are even larger numbers of displaced Syrian and Iraqi children who are associated with IS and whose reintegration in society is a challenge that is getting scant attention.
"This is a problem that cannot be swept under the carpet," said Cappelaere, speaking at the launch of a CD of children's song coinciding with the eighth anniversary of the conflict in Syria.
"These are situations that are not necessarily unprecedented, look back at the Rwandan genocide in the mid-nineties," he added.
"We saw thousands of children there who were associated with people who had been committing atrocities. These children have for a big part been successfully reintegrated within the Rwandan society," he said.
Cappelaere said such efforts are needed in Syria and Iraq.
"There is a solution for these children. It requires political courage, political commitment. These children are children, they are not terrorists," he said.
He said a total of five million children were born since the start of the conflict in 2011.
While fighting has wound up in several parts of Syria in recent months, millions of Syrian children remain in need of basic humanitarian assistance.
Protect children of IS jihadis, Nobel winner urges Europe
[PULSE.NG] Nobel Peace Prize winner Kailash Satyarthi | Who? |
| That’s lovely, but why is he pontificating on the subject? |