Two British women who joined Islamic State have been arrested in northern Syria, with one claiming she travelled to the country and joined the terror group unintentionally.
The mothers and their children are in a camp in northern Syria run by Kurdish authorities, with men suspected of being members of Islamic State in a prison nearby.
One said she and the children have been in the camp for nearly a year, with the other explaining how much of her time under Islamic State had been similar to imprisonment, being unable to leave a woman’s dormitory.
She could not leave “without permission, no-one can visit you and everyone is scared”.
Interviewed by ITV News, the other woman, with her face covered by an Islamic niqab and speaking in a southern English accent, said: “I’m from Britain. What can I say? I didn’t want to come to Syria, you know? I got in touch with the wrong people, you know? And it was a vulnerable time in my life.”
She added: “I got tricked into coming to Syria.”
The one-time women of so-called Islamic State who travelled to Syria from Britain to join the terror organisation have spoken to ITV News, issuing pleas to the UK Government to allow them and their children to return homehttps://t.co/prNat9BMgf pic.twitter.com/bdp1hsHMpl
— ITV News (@itvnews) October 25, 2018
Asked about the future, the woman replied: “Yes, of course, I want my children to go back to the UK. I want them to have a good education.
“I don’t want my children to stay in a refugee camp. This is not life. We’ve been here almost a year.”
Another British woman, speaking in broken English, said: “Take us and children as soon as possible. I don’t want children to stay in Syria. They want to go back to Britain, with their mother.”
ITV reports that Kurdish authorities claim to be overwhelmed and insist the women are Britain’s problem and not theirs, but the British government does not intend to repatriate them.
In response to the women’s claims, a spokesman for the Government said: “The UK advises against all travel to Syria.
“As all UK consular services are suspended in Syria, it is extremely difficult to confirm the whereabouts and status of British nationals there.
“Anyone who does travel to Syria, for whatever reason, is putting themselves in considerable danger.”
180 British Islamists Are Known to Have Been Killed in the Islamic State So Far https://t.co/Pg5zcLdtiY
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) August 24, 2018
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