Bringing 'Em Back or Not? (I.D.'ed Cdn ISIS fighters, families, kids?)

[The Bread Guy]

What the Brits might be doing ...

Britain will consider repatriating orphans and unaccompanied children in north-east Syria if they are alerted to their presence by local military or aid agencies.

Home Office officials said the UK would assist British orphans trapped in Syria after the Turkish invasion, reversing a previous policy that children had to be taken out of the country before they might get any help.

Officials would not say exactly how children might be extracted from the country, implying that SAS or other special forces, still understood to be based in the region, could be involved in the repatriations.

They said children thought to be British would be assessed on a case-by-case basis once removed from Syria and only orphans and unaccompanied children would be eligible to be brought back to the UK.

The shift in policy comes after a BBC reporting team found three English-speaking orphans aged 10 or under in a Syria camp over the weekend. The children are believed to have been taken by their parents to live under Islamic State five years ago ...

 

[The Bread Guy]

Survey says ...

A clear majority of Canadians do not want the government to do anything to bring back ISIS fighters detained abroad.

In a poll conducted exclusively for Global News, Ipsos asked respondents whether they supported the position that “a Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian, and that Canada should do what it can to bring Canadian nationals home to Canada, even if they’ve been fighting for ISIS.”

Only 29 per cent agreed with the statement.

In contrast, 71 per cent said “we should not do anything to help bring these Canadians back to Canada.” ...

More @ link

From Ipsos (highlights mine) ...

... Bill C-24 is a law that aims to strip dual citizens of their Canadian passports if they are convicted of crimes of terrorism, treason or espionage against Canada, or take up arms against Canada. This has been specifically debated in the case of Canadian nationals who have fought with ISIS in Syria and wish to return to Canada.

A majority of Canadians appear to be supportive of the proposed law, with seven in ten (71%) saying ‘we should not do anything to help bring these Canadians back to Canada’. Canadians aged 55+ (83%) are most likely to hold this view, followed by those aged 35-54 (70%) and those 18-34 (56%).

By contrast, three in ten (29%) think that ‘a Canadian is a Canadian, and we should help bring these Canadians back.’ This view is significantly more prevalent among those aged 18-34 (44%), compared to those 35-54 (30%) or 55+ (17%). Regionally, Quebecers (39%) are more likely to hold this opinion than residents of any other province.  

These are some of the findings of an Ipsos poll conducted between October 11 and 13, on behalf of Global News. For this survey, a sample of n = 2,204 Canadians aged 18+ was interviewed. A sample of n = 1,504 was interviewed online, via the Ipsos I-Say panel and non-panel sources, and respondents earn a nominal incentive for their participation. A sample of n = 700 Canadians aged 18+ was interviewed by live-interview telephone interviewers by landline and cellphone, using random-digit dialing. Quotas and weighting were employed to balance demographics to ensure that the sample's composition reflects that of the adult population according to Census data and to provide results intended to approximate the sample universe (weighting efficiency = 66.9%). The precision of Ipsos polls which include non-probability sampling is measured using a credibility interval. In this case, the poll is accurate to within ± 2.4 percentage points, 19 times out of 20, had all Canadians been polled. The credibility interval will be wider among subsets of the population. All sample surveys and polls may be subject to other sources of error, including, but not limited to coverage error, and measurement error. Ipsos abides by the disclosure standards established by the CRIC, found here: https://canadianresearchinsightscouncil.ca/standards/

More @ link or in attached.

 

[Jarnhamar]

They'll come to kill us': Canadian trapped in Syria pleads to UN for help

LONDON -- “Dear United Nations...”

The letter was written by hand on paper that was torn from a notebook.It’s dated October 16, 2019, from a detention camp in Northern Syria. The writer is a Canadian, speaking for 10 women, all once married to ISIS fighters. The sky overhead is now crowded with fighter jets and drones.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/beta.ctvnews.ca/national/world/2019/10/18/1_4645332.html


The letter dated 16 October was torn from a book and sent to the UN. Except when you look at the pictures in the news article the letter is still in the book.

So someone took a picture of the letter, sent the letter to the UN then sent pictures of the letters while inside the tent to the media?
Seems a bit odd..

 

[The Bread Guy]

So someone took a picture of the letter, sent the letter to the UN then sent pictures of the letters while inside the tent to the media? Seems a bit odd..

A U.N. or other NGO worker in the camp who moves back & forth between the camp & their base area/office/HQ could have lots of chances to hook up to the interwebs, no?  Or once it gets into the U.N. IM system, anybody could share it.

 

[Jarnhamar]

I don't know. I'm not suggesting it's fake, just something about it seems off. Don't you find it even a bit strange?

Saying the letter was written on paper torn from a book and sent to the UN. But it's clearly written while still in the book and photographed and shared online and the story done up and posted 2 days later.  Was it mailed from a post office in the camp? Or maybe the person taking the picture will be carrying the letter to the UN?

If there's a connection to the internet why not send an email instead of trusting a letter to find its way. Or making a video, which would be more personal than a letter. Or pictures of the women?



Edit- mods could I ask that my posts be moved to this thread? I thibk it might be more appropriate?

Bringing 'Em Back or Not? (I.D.'ed Cdn ISIS fighters, families, kids?)

 

[The Bread Guy]

Edit- mods could I ask that my posts be moved to this thread? I thibk it might be more appropriate?

Bringing 'Em Back or Not? (I.D.'ed Cdn ISIS fighters, families, kids?)

Good idea - done.

Saying the letter was written on paper torn from a book and sent to the UN. But it's clearly written while still in the book and photographed and shared online and the story done up and posted 2 days later.  Was it mailed from a post office in the camp? Or maybe the person taking the picture will be carrying the letter to the UN?

If there's a connection to the internet why not send an email instead of trusting a letter to find its way. Or making a video, which would be more personal than a letter. Or pictures of the women?

Seen.  Do we know the writer had access to the internet?  I suspect the camps themselves may be ... spartan.  With combinations of the internet and workers moving in and out of the camp, there could be a ton of different combinations to get an image of a letter out there.

So far, a very quick Google-fu shows the CTV story's the only place that has those specific images.  I'll keep hunting & share anything, so that _suggests_ they may have come from whatever intermediary straight to CTV.  We know when the story was published, but we don't know who else got images and/or the hard copy beforehand.

And if we really want to peel the onion layers, just because someone wrote 16 Oct on a piece of paper doesn't mean that's when it was written

As for pictures or videos of the women, if the camps are still as ISIS-ridden as some say, I wouldn't want to be the one suggesting a selfie in them parts  ;D

 

[The Bread Guy]

A couple of perspectives, this one from academics/analysts who've visited the camps ...

As we head into the Canadian federal election next week, one of the many pressing issues facing the new government will be the question of what to do with the nearly 40 Canadian men, women, and children currently in Kurdish custody in northeastern Syria.

We visited the camps and the prisons over the course of a week earlier this month, and the challenges we documented were immense and since the invasion by Turkey, those problems are only getting worse. On the day we visited al-Hol camp, which houses most of the Canadian women and their children, Kurdish forces supposedly interrupted a meeting of the “morality police” who were, apparently, getting set to punish one of their fellow women for some sort of religious violation.

The Kurdish police were able to stop the meeting, and arrest some of the women. Upset by these arrests, several women in the camp began, with babies and toddlers in their arms and at their feet, chanting and moving aggressively towards Kurdish police and SDF officers. Kurdish police started firing their weapons into the air to disperse the crowds. We were told it was safer if we left. What happened next is unclear, but the situation clearly escalated with several women killed and injured. It was a vivid illustration of the volatile situation in the camp, one housing over 50,000 children under the age of 12 from over 55 countries. The prisons, housing the male ISIS suspects, is little different.

What is perhaps most striking is the dichotomy between the realities on the ground and the nature of the policy debate in Canada. We have heard several arguments against repatriation during the many years we have been involved in this debate. We address some of the most widely held myths below:

Myth 1: They Made Their Choice. It is Not Our Problem.

(...)

Myth 2: If They Come Back Here, We Won’t Be Able to Charge Them, and They Will Go Free

(...)

Myth 3: Canada Doesn’t Have the Resources to Deal with Them

(...)

Myth 4: An International Court is the Answer

(...)

Myth 5: It is Too Dangerous for Canada to Send Officials

(...)

... and another broader news piece quoting several folks:

n the midst of an uncertain future in northeastern Syria where Turkish forces have been attacking Syrian Kurdish positions for more than a week, some experts say the situation should press Canada to act on repatriating its detained citizens in ISIS detention camps.

Turkey launched its offensive into Syria on Oct. 9 after U.S. President Donald Trump announced American troops would vacate the Turkish-Syrian border area.

Following the onset of the offensive, a Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) commander said that guarding the camps that hold thousands of detained ISIS members as well as some who lived in regions under the control of ISIS would not be a “priority.” In northeastern Syria, the SDF includes the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and Women’s Protection Units (YPJ). Turkey views the SDF as being connected to the separatist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which is listed as a terrorist entity by the Canadian government.

A five-day ceasefire was negotiated between Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and U.S. Vice-President Mike Pence on Oct. 17. But before the ceasefire was 24 hours old, Kurds accused Turkey of violating the truce. Turkey denied fighting was taking place.

Under the ceasefire agreement, Turkey and the United States would jointly coordinate the ISIS detention camps and the internally displaced people in regions formerly under the control of ISIS.

NBC News reported last week before the ceasefire was reached that SDF guards at one camp that holds 5,000, threatened to leave the camp to go to the front-lines.

“Ironically, the Government of Canada was saying for the last 18 months that it was too dangerous for them to send consular officials into Syria—even as journalists, law enforcement officials from other countries, and researchers were in and out of the country,” said Amarnath Amarasingam, a professor at Queen’s University who is an expert on foreign fighters, in an email to The Hill Times.

“Now, it has kind of become a self-fulfilling prophecy,” he said. Prof. Amarasingam visited a SDF-controlled ISIS detention camp before the Turkish offensive began ...

More @ links

 

[The Bread Guy]

Interesting approach by Russia ...

Russia has taken DNA samples from 49 orphans in Syria to confirm their relations to Russian citizens and clear their return home, Russia’s top children’s rights official said Thursday.

Under a program spearheaded by Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, Russia has worked on returning women and children linked to Russians who fought for the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq. Kadyrov last year called for mass DNA tests in his majority-Muslim region to help repatriate Russian children from the war-torn countries.

Russia was granted access to 49 orphans held in Syrian jails and camps for DNA testing, Interfax cited presidential children’s rights ombudsperson Anna Kuznetsova as saying. Some children are said to be younger than 6 months.

Kuznetsova said that Russian citizens identified as the children’s relatives have also submitted DNA samples to establish family kinship.

An Emergency Situations Ministry flight from neighboring Iraq with 32 Russian children on board is expected soon, Kuznetsova said. The remaining children, she added, will return from Iraq by civilian aircraft.

Meanwhile, the chief of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has warned that adult Islamic State fighters should undergo close vetting by the countries where they’re being held as well as by Russia before being cleared for repatriation ...

 

[Jarnhamar]

A month before a Canadian convicted of trying to join ISIS was released from an Ontario prison in June, he was denied parole on the grounds he posed too great a risk, newly released records show.


Prosecutors wanted him to serve six yearsbut on Feb. 28, a judge sentenced him to four years and one month, saying he had taken responsibility for his actions and had been “a positive role model.”

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/canada/toronto-man-who-tried-to-join-isis-was-freed-month-after-his-release-was-declared-an-undue-risk/ar-BBWWoh9

 

[The Bread Guy]

A month before a Canadian convicted of trying to join ISIS was released from an Ontario prison in June, he was denied parole on the grounds he posed too great a risk, newly released records show.


Prosecutors wanted him to serve six yearsbut on Feb. 28, a judge sentenced him to four years and one month, saying he had taken responsibility for his actions and had been “a positive role model.”

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/canada/toronto-man-who-tried-to-join-isis-was-freed-month-after-his-release-was-declared-an-undue-risk/ar-BBWWoh9

More backstory on this guy here and here.

 

[The Bread Guy]

What the Brits might be doing ...

What the Brits are doing ...

The UK government is to repatriate the first British citizens from the area of north-eastern Syria formerly under the control of the Islamic State (IS) group, the BBC has learned.

For security reasons, further details of the repatriation cannot be given.

The individuals being brought out of the region will be returned to the UK in the coming days.

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said the "innocent" children should "never have been subjected to the horrors of war".

He added: "We have facilitated their return home, because it was the right thing to do.

"Now they must be allowed the privacy and given the support to return to a normal life." ...

 

[The Bread Guy]

And in Holland ...

A Dutch appeals court has overturned a lower court’s order that the government must attempt to bring home children whose mothers traveled to Syria to join Islamic extremist groups.

Friday’s decision upheld the government’s appeal against that ruling. Reasons for the decision will be published next month.

Justice Minister Ferd Grapperhaus has welcomed the decision as supporting the government’s policy of not repatriating women and children from Syria if they went there to join the Islamic State group.

Grapperhaus says “these women made the choice, with or without children, to travel to IS territory and join a terrorist organization. The Cabinet will not actively bring them back from the region.”

Lawyers representing 23 women and their 56 children sought an injunction earlier this month forcing the government to repatriate them.

 

[The Bread Guy]

In Ireland ...

• "Lisa Smith: Isis recruit and former member of Irish military arrested after arriving in Dublin"
• "Lisa Smith arrested on suspicion of terrorist offences"
• "Gardaí have arrested Lisa Smith on suspicion of terrorist offences following her return to Ireland this morning.  Her two-year-old daughter is being cared for by relatives, gardaí said.  The Islamic state supporter landed in Dublin airport with her daughter shortly after 10am.  She was handed over to the gardaí on arrival. Footage from RTÉ showed a woman, apparently Ms Smith, being escorted off the plane, covered by a blanket ..."

 

[brihard]

Canadian arrested in Turkey this summer charged with terror offences

Ikar Mao, 22, of Guelph, Ont., was detained near the Syrian border but returned to Canada in October
Katie Nicholson, Jason Ho · CBC News · Posted: Dec 06, 2019 12:16 PM ET

A Canadian man detained in Turkey this past summer and accused of having ISIS propaganda on his phone was charged by RCMP Friday with terror-related offences.

Ikar Mao, 22, of Guelph, Ont., faces one count of participation in activity of a terrorist group and one count of leaving Canada to participate in activity of a terrorist group.

Each charge carries a maximum sentence of 10 years.

In a news release, the RCMP said the charges came "following a national security investigation" by the Integrated National Security Enforcement Team in Ontario.

"I want to reassure the citizens of the Greater Toronto Area and all Canadians that our primary focus is the safety and protection of the public at all times," RCMP Chief Supt. Michael LeSage said in the release.

Couple returned to Canada in October
Turkish authorities arrested Mao and his wife near the Syrian border this past summer.

The newlywed couple were held for three months before being released and returning to Canada in October.

As CBC News first reported late Thursday, a Turkish court heard allegations that the phone belonging to Mao had received ISIS videos via Telegram, an encrypted messaging app, and that the couple left a letter for their families saying they intended to join ISIS.

The videos depict ISIS soldiers with guns espousing the militant group's propaganda, the court heard.

Records viewed by CBC News said Mao and his wife denied that they had left their families to join ISIS and told the court they just wanted to live in a Muslim country.

Mao said he hadn't intentionally sought out the videos, but that they had loaded automatically while he was surfing the internet.

In the past several weeks, Mao has been living under strict court-imposed conditions, including wearing a GPS monitor, abiding by a curfew and having limited access to the internet. Ontario Court of Justice documents cited a "fear of terrorism offence."

The case is under a publication ban, and it's not clear what evidence Canadian authorities are relying on for their case.

Mao is scheduled to appear in a court in Brampton, Ont., about 45 km northwest of Toronto, later Friday.

- - - - - - - - - -


BZ to the INSET guys on this one. Using information from foreign sources to build a case - particularly from that part of the world - is fraught with challenges, so I applaud them for getting this to the point where crown would go for it.

Now cue the usual inane stuff about $10 million, etc etc...

 

[The Bread Guy]

What the Brits are doing ...

The UK government is to repatriate the first British citizens from the area of north-eastern Syria formerly under the control of the Islamic State (IS) group, the BBC has learned.

For security reasons, further details of the repatriation cannot be given.

The individuals being brought out of the region will be returned to the UK in the coming days ...

Not so fast???

Fears are growing that the Foreign Office has paved the way for British Islamic State captives held in Syria to be handed over to the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, which is accused of war crimes including mass torture and executions.

Human rights groups argue that, as they face pressure to repatriate Britons detainedin Syria, ministers’ inaction may result in the transfer of UK nationals to Assad’s forces.

The legal charity Reprieve says that differing statements from the Foreign Office indicate that the government has diluted its previous opposition to British nationals being prosecuted in Assad-controlled Syria ...

 

[The Bread Guy]

One case ...

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said it was “too dangerous” to send in Canadian diplomats to remove four-year-old Canadian orphan Amira from the al-Hol detention camp -- after Kurdish authorities confirmed they found the child over the weekend.

In a one-on-one interview with CTV News’ Chief Anchor and Senior Editor Lisa LaFlamme, Trudeau said that he was aware of the little girl’s story, but that the safety of Canadians who work in the Middle East needs to be considered.

“Right now we've qualified it as too dangerous for Canadian officials to go into Syria and into those refugee camps,” he said.

It has been almost a year since Amira was discovered wandering alone in the Syrian town of Baghouz after her family -- Canadians who had left the country in 2014 to fight for ISIS -- were killed in an airstrike.

Amira was taken to the detention camp in northeastern Syria where she was living with a surrogate family, in a situation that Minister of Public Safety Ralph Goodale has previously called “horrendous.”

Life inside the camp is often described as desperate, with lack of water and access to medical care major concerns for the more than 11,000 foreign women and children of ISIS fighters are detained.

It is estimated that at least 33 Canadians women and children are detained in al-Hol and a second nearby camp.

Amira’s uncle and grandparents in Canada have been calling on the Canadian government to rescue the child for months -- using other countries like Sweden, Australia and France as examples of governments who have sent in personnel to extract women and children left behind after the years of war with the caliphate.

The government has previously told Amira’s family that she must undergo a DNA test to prove that she is a Canadian citizen before she can be issued travel papers -- which would take months.

This past summer Amira’s uncle, who wishes to remain anonymous, was determined to go to Syria himself to try to locate her and bring her home, but Kurdish Foreign Affairs Minister Dr. Abdulkarim Omar advised him not to travel until her location was confirmed.

This weekend, Kurdish authorities sent a message saying that Amira had finally been located.

“We informed the Canadian authorities about her whereabouts,” Omar said. “The Canadian government is aware of Amira’s situation right now.”

Canada has yet to formally request the child’s release, something her uncle is hopeful will change now that she has finally been located ...

 

[The Bread Guy]

More on what the Brits are (at least reportedly) doing ...

A Special Air Service (SAS) team rescued three orphans born to parents fighting for the Islamic State (ISIS).

The parents of the three children had been killed during a Coalition airstrike earlier this year. The rescue operation took place sometime during the last two months. The SAS element was accompanied by a few Foreign Office personnel.

According to the British Foreign Office, more such rescues will take place in the coming weeks and months.

Since 2015, when an SAS Sabre Squadron was first deployed in Iraq to assist the U.S.-led coalition against ISIS, the British Army’s Tier One unit has suffered one fatality: In March 2018, Sergeant Matt Tonroe and Delta Force Master Sergeant John Dunbar were killed during a raid against an ISIS high-value target (HVT) in Manbij, Syria, in March of 2018. (SOFREP previously published the exclusive story behind the deaths of the two operators.) The SAS has also suffered a number of wounded operators in action during its fight against the Jihadist terrorists.

The three children rescued have been received by foster parents back in the United Kingdom. Their identities remain, and for a good reason, hidden.

European nations are still struggling to figure out what to do with their nationals, known as Foreign Terrorist Fighters (FTFs) who went off to join and fight for the Islamic State. The issue has even become a point of diplomatic tension between nations like France and Germany. U.S. President Trump has been pressing his European counterparts to assume responsibility for their nationals and take them back. But we aren’t talking about a couple of dozens of shitheads. More than 40,000 people from around the world went off to join ISIS; approximately 5,000 of them hail from Europe. The majority of those who have survived the Coalition’s raids and airstrikes are detainees in prisoner camps guarded by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). A lot of those camps, however, have been jeopardized by the Turkish invasion of Northern Syria, thereby bringing an additional sense of urgency to the matter.

A convenient solution to this diplomatic and political conundrum would be to strip FTFs of their citizenship. But this can only happen if they are dual-citizens, in which case it often becomes a race between the countries concerned of which will be the one that first strips the person in question of their citizenship. The British have already stripped citizenship from over 100 FTFs. The majority of the FTFs, however, have only one citizenship, muddying the waters even more ...

More @ link

 

[The Bread Guy]

A bit of one Canadian's story ...

After spending two weeks in northeastern Syria, a Canadian man finally got to hold his four-year-old orphaned niece in his arms. He was able to show her pictures of her grandparents in Toronto, and then he was forced to leave the country -- without her.

(...)

Amira and her uncle had an hour together in crowded surroundings, before she was taken back to join the other children, perhaps expecting her uncle would return the next day and take her to Canada.

But that never happened.

Just days before, there had been extremely good news. At long last, Global Affairs had accepted Amira’s identity, removing the biggest obstacle in her struggle.

I won’t name the official who sent the note, but for the record, here is what she said:

“I would like to inform you that DNA testing will not be required, as the Government of Canada has now established Amira’s identity and links to Canada.”

For the family, here was the best part:

“This means that she is now eligible to receive Canadian citizenship.”

The uncle learned one crucial detail in his meetings with Kurdish officials. They told him they would be happy to release Amira, once a Canadian diplomat had travelled to the region to make a formal request.

That apparently was a red line. Canada has consistently argued the situation is too dangerous to offer consular services, even though many other countries have done exactly that.

In response to written questions, a Global Affairs spokesman told me Canada is “actively engaged on this case with local authorities,” but would not confirm Amira’s citizenship status.

“We are likewise in regular contact with the family of the child’s deceased parents and are working with them on this sensitive and complex situation -- driven by the best interests of the child.”

(...)

 

[The Bread Guy]

Possible Kurdish solution?

Syrian Kurdish officials seem firm on moving ahead with their plans to put captured Islamic State (IS) foreign fighters on trial in Syria, despite little international support.

Nearly one year after declaring the physical defeat of IS’s so-called caliphate in eastern Syria, Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a Kurdish-led military alliance backed by the U.S., says it is ready to try IS foreign fighters through its local judicial system.

“Since all evidences, witnesses and victims [of IS fighters] are present in our region, we have proposed to hold their trials here.” said Kamal Akif, a spokesperson for the foreign relations office at the Kurdish-led administration in northeast Syria.

“We have been discussing this issue with all sides,” he told VOA.

The SDF holds about 12,000 IS fighters, including 2,000 foreign fighters who hail from about 50 countries. There are also about 12,000 foreign women and children affiliated with the terror group that are held in detention camps in eastern Syria.

Many of the countries IS fighters come from have largely declined to take them back. Thus, the SDF hopes its new proposal would garner enough support from countries such as the U.S., France, Britain and Germany.

“So far we have received positive vibes from our international partners,” Akif said, adding that they “could soon begin practical matters” related to trying IS foreign fighters.

Other Kurdish officials have said that proceedings would get under way as soon as this month.

International reluctance

Western governments, however, have been reluctant to approve this move.

“We believe that foreign terrorist fighters need to be returned to their home countries,” Ambassador James Jeffrey, the U.S. special envoy to Syria, told reporters in February.

“The policy should be, as we have done with some eight people brought back, is to put them on trial,” he said.

A small number of Americans who had joined IS in Syria have been sent back to the U.S. to face terrorism charges, according to U.S. officials.

(...)

Despite controlling nearly one third of Syria’s territory, the SDF-led administration is not an internationally-recognized entity. And this, experts said, would perhaps make it tricky for local Kurdish authorities in northeast Syria to carry out such trials.“

What makes this even more complicated is that the SDF autonomous administration doesn’t have formal relations with the Syrian regime, which is at least recognized internationally,” said Sadradeen Kinno, a Syrian researcher specialized in Islamist militancy.

He said that “what the SDF is trying to justify is that these foreign fighters have committed crimes on Syrian territory, therefore it is totally legal to try them for such crimes inside Syria.”

But Kurdish official Akif stressed that, “We want these trials to be in accordance with international law and standards.”

For example, unlike in neighboring Iraq, the Syrian Kurdish administration said it will not impose the death penalty on IS detainees.

SDF-run courts also have been convicting Syrian IS fighters and acquitting those who were found not involved in perpetrating violent acts.

 

[The Bread Guy]

There was an incredible podcast called Caliphate. Ten part series or something. Went into great detail and interviews with former ISIS Canadian. Highly recommend this podcast for folks interested in the subject. Major takeaway:  proving crimes overseas is a difficult task according to canadian criminal justice standards.

Didn't know whether to put this one here, or in the Walts thread, but it appears to have come full circle ....

A Canadian whose widely-publicized account of conducting executions for ISIS fueled public outrage and debate in the House of Commons has been charged with allegedly making it up.

Shehroze Chaudhry, 25, who has portrayed himself as a former ISIS member living freely in Canada, was charged with faking his involvement in the terrorist group.

The Burlington, Ont. resident is to appear in court on Nov. 16 to face a terrorism hoax charge. Reached at work, he declined to comment.

The son of an Oakville shawarma and kabob shop owner, Chaudhry has been posting on social media and telling reporters and others since 2016 that he was a former member of the ISIS religious police in Syria.

Two sources who know him said that, under the alias Abu Huzayfah, he was the subject of the award-winning New York Times podcast Caliphate, where he described conducting public executions.

His Facebook page profile has also described him as “Abu Huzayfa” and a “mujahid” or jihadist.

RCMP spokeswoman Sgt. Lucie Lapointe also confirmed in an email sent to Global News on Friday evening that Chaudhry was the Abu Huzayfah featured in the New York Times podcast.

The charge “stems from numerous media interviews” that were “published in multiple media outlets, aired on podcasts and featured on a television documentary, raising public safety concerns amongst Canadians,” the RCMP said in a statement ...

From the Mounties ...

Following a lengthy investigation, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) O Division Integrated National Security Enforcement Team (OINSET) arrested and charged an individual today in connection with a hoax regarding terrorist activity.

The charge stems from numerous media interviews where the accused, Shehroze Chaudhry, a 25-year-old from Burlington, Ontario, claimed he travelled to Syria in 2016 to join the terrorist group ISIS and committed acts of terrorism. The interviews were published in multiple media outlets, aired on podcasts and featured on a television documentary, raising public safety concerns amongst Canadians.

Shehroze Chaudhry was charged with Hoax-Terrorist activity, contrary to section 83.231(1) of the Criminal Code. He is scheduled to appear at the Brampton (A. Grenville & William Davis) Courthouse located at 7755 Hurontario Street in Brampton, Ontario on November 16, 2020 at 09:00am, courtroom 104 ...

As always, presumed innocent until proven guilty via due process, but potentially going to jail because he (at least allegedly) pretended to be a terrorist?  The irony burns ....