Morocco plans repatriation of IS-linked citizens from Iraq, official says

By Ahmed Eljechtimi

RABAT, March 12 (Reuters) – Morocco is developing plans to repatriate its nationals who fought for Islamic State in Syria and were transferred by the United States into Iraqi detention, ​a senior security official said on Thursday.

The U.S. began moving detained ‌IS members out of Syria in January after the collapse of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which had been guarding around a dozen facilities holding IS fighters and affiliated civilians, including foreigners.

Last month, the U.S. Central Command said the U.S. military had ‌completed ​its mission in Syria after transferring 5,700 adult ⁠male Islamic State detainees ⁠to Iraq.

Iraq has since then urged Muslim and Western nations to repatriate their nationals.

Morocco “is currently developing an action plan on this matter … taking into consideration the diversity of the population targeted by the procedure, ​namely the fighters, as well as the women who lived in the SDF camps in Syria, in addition to their children,” a security ⁠official close to the matter told Reuters.

There ⁠were 1,667 Moroccan foreign fighters in Syria and Iraq, of ​whom 244 were detained in prisons controlled by the SDF in northeastern ​Syria, while 279 former fighters have returned to the Kingdom, the ‌official said.

The official added that 269 Moroccan women remain in the conflict zone along with 627 minors, while 134 women and 354 children are being held in SDF-run camps in northeastern Syria. So far, 125 women ⁠have returned to Morocco since the beginning of the Syrian crisis.

In March 2019, Morocco repatriated eight fighters detained by the SDF, who stood trial in Morocco ⁠and now are serving ‌sentences ranging from 13 to 18 years on ⁠terrorism charges.

Joining jihadist groups abroad is punishable by up ​to 10 ‌years in jail under Moroccan law. In recent ​years, IS branches ⁠in Africa have recruited more than 130 Moroccan fighters, the head of Morocco’s counter-terrorism agency, the Central Bureau of Judicial Investigations (BCIJ), Haboub Cherkaoui said last year.

Since its establishment in 2015, the BCIJ has dismantled dozens of militant cells and arrested more than 1,000 suspected jihadists.

(Reporting by Ahmed El Jechtimi, Editing ​by William Maclean)