At least 2 Canadian women and their children returning from ISIS detention camp
At least two Canadian women have left a detention camp in Syria and will be arriving in Canada on Wednesday morning, CBC News has learned.
The women left the al-Roj camp in northeastern Syria — which holds women allegedly tied to ISIS and their children — and were headed for northern Iraq on Tuesday morning with an unknown number of children, according to multiple sources.
Ottawa lawyer Lawrence Greenspon said he has learned that Kimberly Polman, his client, is out of the camp and her tent has been taken down.
Greenspon said Global Affairs Canada told him Polman and the others being repatriated are all expected to arrive in Montreal on Wednesday.
“It’s very good news,” said Greenspon. “It shows Canada … is capable of bringing home our Canadian nationals held in detention.”
Greenspon is representing 23 Canadian men, women and children who are being held in ISIS detention camps in northeastern Syria. He has been pushing at the Federal Court to get them home.
He said he’s “certain” that the federal government is allowing Polman to return home due to her health. He confirmed Polman qualified for “extraordinary assistance” under a new policy adopted last year by Global Affairs Canada for those who could not be treated in Syria for life-threatening medical conditions.
“She has been in detention camp for over three years,” said Greenspon. “Her health is very dire. She’s in a very tenuous health situation.”
The repatriation effort comes eight months after United Nations human rights experts urged Canada to repatriate Polman and said her conditions met the definition of “torture, cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.”
The UN’s experts said Polman travelled to Syria in 2015. Polman, who was featured in the documentary “The Return: Life after ISIS,” said she was in a “terrible place” when she was found online by the ISIS member who later became her husband.
Her sister told CBC News last year that Polman’s “basic human rights are not being met.” She said her sister “had a right to a fair trial at the very least, or being charged with something” before she was detained.
Source: Cbc
