Syrian Kurdish Officials Hand over 50 Women and Children Linked to ISIS to Tajikistan

FILE - Kurdish forces patrol al-Hol camp, which houses families of members of the ISIS group in Hasakeh province, Syria, on April 19, 2023. (AP Photo/Baderkhan Ahmad, File)
FILE - Kurdish forces patrol al-Hol camp, which houses families of members of the ISIS group in Hasakeh province, Syria, on April 19, 2023. (AP Photo/Baderkhan Ahmad, File)
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Syrian Kurdish Officials Hand over 50 Women and Children Linked to ISIS to Tajikistan

FILE - Kurdish forces patrol al-Hol camp, which houses families of members of the ISIS group in Hasakeh province, Syria, on April 19, 2023. (AP Photo/Baderkhan Ahmad, File)
FILE - Kurdish forces patrol al-Hol camp, which houses families of members of the ISIS group in Hasakeh province, Syria, on April 19, 2023. (AP Photo/Baderkhan Ahmad, File)

Kurdish-led authorities in northeastern Syria on Thursday handed over 50 women and children — family members of ISIS militants — to a delegation from Tajikistan for repatriation back home.
The 17 women and 33 children, all citizens of Tajikistan, were handed over to a delegation headed by the Tajik ambassador to Kuwait, Zubaydullo Zubaydzoda, Syrian Kurdish officials said.
After the ISIS group declared its caliphate in large parts of Syria and Iraq in June 2014, thousands of foreigners, including hundreds from Tajikistan, came to Syria to join the group and live with their families.
After ISIS was defeated, most of the militants' family members were held in the sprawling al-Hol camp and the smaller Roj camp in northeastern Syria.
The Syrian Arab Red Crescent said the women and children were taken to the airport of Qamishli where they boarded a plane “to be reunited with their families” in Tajikistan on Thursday.
The repatriation came almost a month after an attack on a suburban Moscow concert hall that killed 144 people. The massacre was carried out by four suspected attackers who were arrested and identified as Tajik nationals. ISIS claimed responsibility and said four of its fighters had targeted the hall in Russia.
Over the past few years thousands of people, mostly Iraqis have been repatriated from al-Hol, which houses tens of thousands, mostly ISIS militants' wives and children but also supporters of the militant group.
The heavily-guarded al-Hol, overseen by Syrian Kurdish-led forces allied with the United States, was once home to 73,000 people, mostly Syrians and Iraqis. Over the past few years, the population dropped to about 43,000, according to Sheikhmous Ahmad, a Kurdish official overseeing camps for displaced people in northeastern Syria.
Tajikistan has said that at the height of ISIS, more than 1,000 fighters from the country joined extremist groups in Syria and Iraq, including ISIS. One of the most prominent was Gulmurod Khalimov, an officer with Tajikistan’s special forces who defected and joined ISIS in Syria in 2015.
Khalimov rose through ISIS ranks to become one of its top military commanders. In September 2017, the Russian military said he was killed in a Russian airstrike in Syria’s eastern province of Deir el-Zour, which borders Iraq.
Thursday’s repatriation of Tajik citizens is not the first. Last May, 104 Tajik citizens were returned home, including 31 women and 73 children. And the year before, 146 women and children were repatriated.



Iranian FM from Beirut: We Respect Lebanon’s Internal Affairs

Lebanese Foreign Minister Youssef Rajji, left, receives his Iranian counterpart Abbas Araghchi, center, in Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Lebanese Foreign Minister Youssef Rajji, left, receives his Iranian counterpart Abbas Araghchi, center, in Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
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Iranian FM from Beirut: We Respect Lebanon’s Internal Affairs

Lebanese Foreign Minister Youssef Rajji, left, receives his Iranian counterpart Abbas Araghchi, center, in Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Lebanese Foreign Minister Youssef Rajji, left, receives his Iranian counterpart Abbas Araghchi, center, in Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Tuesday that considering the regional developments, Iran is keen on opening a new chapter in its relations with Lebanon, assuring that his country respects Lebanon’s internal matters and does not meddle in them.

Araghchi, who arrived on Tuesday in Beirut coming from Egypt where he convened with senior officials, met with his Lebanese counterpart Youssef Rajji at the foreign ministry’s headquarters in Downtown Beirut.

Araghchi said he has meetings scheduled with Lebanese President Jospeh Aoun, PM Nawaf Salam and his Lebanese counterpart.

“My trip to Lebanon comes as part of my tour in the region”, the state-run National News Agency quoted Araghchi as saying after he arrived at the airport.

“We respect Lebanon’s internal matters; we do not interfere in them. We also support Lebanon’s sovereignty during difficult times just like we did before”, he stated, noting that Iran attaches great importance to Lebanon’s independence, sovereignty and unity.

“I hope there would be a new leaf of relations with Lebanon based on mutual respect”, he added.

A Visit with Political Goals

According to sources who spoke to Asharq al-Awsat on condition of anonymity, the Iranian diplomat’s visit has political goals as it coincides with a new round of US-Iran nuclear talks that reports say still faces hurdles amid Tehran’s insistence that they are strictly for peaceful purposes.

The visit was not coordinated in advance with the Lebanese state but came at the Iranian minister’s request, the source added, noting that Araghchi seeks to meet senior Lebanese officials to discuss matters of key importance for his country.