ICRC says Syria’s Hawl residents must be regarded as “human beings”
QAMISHLI, Syria (North Press) – As countries continue to evade responsibility towards nationals trapped in the most dangerous camp globally Hawl camp in northeast Syria, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Friday that the international community and states must be consider them as “human beings.”
Suhair Zakkout, a spokeswoman for the ICRC in Syria, told The National that “countries and governments should not turn their backs on the population and their citizens who are inside…we have to show the human side to not let those people down.”
Hawl Camp, 45 km east of the city of Hasakah, is a house for 55.829 individuals, including 28.725 Iraqis, 18.850 Syrians and 8.254 of foreign nationalities, according to the latest statistics obtained by North Press.
Some of those living inside the camp are family members of suspected Islamic State (ISIS) militants.
Zakkout stressed that when talking about the Hawl resident, it is not a matter of their “legality or any legitimacy… What we are talking about is humanity.”
ISIS lost its final stronghold in Syria in March 2019. The SDF, with the support of the Global Coalition, defeated ISIS after fierce battles in the town of Baghouz in the eastern countryside of Deir ez-Zor, bringing an end to the ISIS so-called caliphate.
After Baghouz, thousands of ISIS fighters were transferred to prisons, while their families were transferred to Hawl and Roj camps in the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES)-held areas.
Five years after the defeat of ISIS in Syria, the issue of families perceived as associated with the group, known as ISIS families, still poses considerable security, social and economic challenges to the limited-capability Kurdish-led local authority in northeast Syria.
The spokeswoman for the ICRC in Syria stressed that “the majority or two thirds” of the camp’s residents are of children and women who are living in “very harsh conditions.”
“A colleague from the mental health programme described the situation for children inside as a lost generation. They are without hope,” Zakkout said.