A notorious camp in Syria that housed tens of thousands of women and children with alleged links to the Islamic State group has been emptied, with its final residents transferred over recent weeks, according to Syrian officials. Fadi al-Qassem, the Syrian Foreign Ministry representative for the al-Hol camp administration, said the final convoy departed the remote facility in northeastern Syria on Sunday morning.
The evacuation marks a significant shift in managing the sprawling displacement created after IS’s 2019 defeat. As Syrian authorities assumed control of the facility from Kurdish-led forces in a recent offensive, the closure raises questions about the repatriation of thousands of women and children whose countries have struggled with return decisions.
Syria has emptied al-Hol, a notorious camp in its northeastern desert that once held tens of thousands of women and children with alleged links to the Islamic State group. The final convoy departed Sunday morning, according to Fadi al-Qassem, the Syrian Foreign Ministry representative for the camp’s administration.
The evacuation
Hundreds of residents have been transferred to the Akhtarin camp in Aleppo province in recent weeks. Others have been repatriated to Iraq, with the United Nations refugee agency assisting in the return of 191 Iraqi citizens on Thursday. According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a U.K.-based war monitor, an unspecified number of residents “left the camp individually, without waiting for the organized convoys.”
A displaced population dwindles
After the Islamic State’s defeat in 2019, approximately 73,000 people were living at al-Hol—most of them Syrian and Iraqi citizens, but also thousands from other countries. The population had declined to about 24,000 as of last month. The camp’s residents are mostly women, including wives or widows of IS members, and their children.
Although not technically prisoners, residents were held in de facto detention at the heavily guarded facility for years. Most have not been accused of crimes.
Syrian forces assume control
Last month, Syrian government forces captured the al-Hol camp in a weeks-long offensive against the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, which had been running the camp near the border with Iraq for a decade. A ceasefire deal has since ended the fighting between the two forces. Many families are believed to have escaped during and after the military campaign.
Countries balking at return
The evacuation has exposed friction in the international repatriation effort. Syrian authorities turned back a group of 34 Australian women and children on February 16 after they left the nearby Roj camp—a smaller facility still under Kurdish control—headed toward Damascus to board a flight back to Australia. Australian authorities subsequently said they would not repatriate the families.
A Syrian government official who spoke on condition of anonymity attributed the issue to “the lack of prior coordination with the Syrian government” by the SDF and families before attempting to send them to Damascus. The official said that “whether they will be allowed (to return) will depend on the Australian government.”
The fate of the Roj camp, which remains under SDF control, is uncertain. Most of its residents are foreigners whose countries have largely refused to take them back.