Children of Australian terrorist Khaled Sharrouf held in Syrian refugee camp
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The three surviving children of Australian terrorist Khaled Sharrouf have reportedly fled Syria’s last IS stronghold and are being held in a refugee camp within the country.
According to the ABC, Zaynab,17, Hoda, 16, and Humzeh, 8, escaped the fighting in Baghouz before it was attacked by the US-backed Syrian Defence Force.
They are understood to be in the Kurdish-controlled Al-Hawl camp alongside eight other Australian women and their children.
The ABC said Zaynab also had two children of her own while in Syria and they are also in the camp.
Grandmother and great-grandmother Karen Nettleton told the network they should all be allowed back to Australia.
“Zaynab is seven-and-a-half months pregnant, she’s feeling very fatigued,” Ms Nettleton said.
She said one of the children, “has foot injury … with has no feeling in her foot so it’s very difficult for her to get around”.
Amid reports they are with other Australian and foreign IS fighters, Ms Nettleton said, “they shouldn’t be in amongst all of that”.
Sharrouf gained international notoriety in 2014 when he posted a photo to social media of one his children holding the severed head of a Syrian government soldier in Raqqa, a former IS stronghold.
He is understood to have been killed in a Coalition air strike on Syria in 2017.
Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton called him a “despicable human being”.
Sharrouf’s five children were taken to Syria in 2014 by their mother Tara, who is believed to have died of a medical condition in 2015.
Sons Abdullah and Zarqawi are believed to have died aged nine and eight in 2017.
The government has not commented on revelations about Sharrouf’s surviving family members.
But earlier this year, Prime Minister Scott Morrison told the ABC “Australia is not in a position to offer any safe passage to people who are in that part of the world”.
“And that is very concerning for the fact that there are children involved in this, and their parents, Khaled Sharrouf in particular, who committed despicable crimes, have placed their children in harm’s way,” he said.
“We will deal with that issue sensitively, but we must remember that both parents, including Khaled Sharrouf’s wife, committed crimes, being where they were, doing what they were doing.”
It comes a team of international lawyers launched a landmark bid in an NSW tribunal, seeking compensation for human rights violations suffered by Yazidi women at the hands of Sharrouf.
On Monday, the Sydney Morning Herald and Age reported that an Australian IS fighter also being held by Kurdish forces was begging Australia to bring him and his family home.
Mohammed Noor Masri, 26, from Sydney is in Syria with his wife and three children.
“[I feel] remorseful, regretful. I mean, people make mistakes. And you have to pay the price for your mistake,” Mr Masri told the newspapers.
“What do I think should happen to me now? Whatever God decrees. I’m accepting of that.
“I would prefer to be prosecuted in Australia or under international law because you have things such as human rights and … justice, so that would be the preferred option.”
Additional reporting: AAP
Article source: https://www.watoday.com.au/national/western-australia/hang-glider-practising-for-major-event-killed-near-merredin-20190224-p50zvb.html?ref=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_source=rss_feed
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