In exclusive statements to Alhurra, U.S. Central Command said the transfer of nearly 7,000 ISIS detainees from Syria to Iraq will take days rather than weeks, while an Iraqi government spokesperson said Baghdad approved the operation as a “preemptive security measure” in light of rapidly evolving events in Syria.
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) Spokesperson Capt. Tim Hawkins said in exclusive remarks to Alhurra, sent via email, that “U.S. forces are immediately transferring up to 7,000 ISIS detainees from Syrian custody to Iraqi authorities.”
Hawkins added that “the transfer of detainees from Syria to Iraq is intended to ensure that terrorists remain in secure detention facilities,” responding to a question about the reasons behind the move.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio welcomed the Iraqi government’s initiative to detain ISIS terrorists in secure facilities in Iraq. In a statement issued Thursday, he said that “non-Iraqi terrorists will remain in Iraq temporarily,” and that “Washington urges countries to assume responsibility and repatriate their citizens held in these facilities to their home countries for prosecution.”
For his part, an Iraqi government spokesperson said in exclusive comments to Alhurra that Baghdad’s approval of transferring ISIS detainees from prisons previously run by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) into Iraq was a “preemptive security measure” linked to developments in Syria.
Bassem al-Awadi said that “events in Syria developed rapidly, and suddenly there was a new reality. As a result, some prisons began to open, leading to the escape of large numbers of inmates, which required the Iraqi government to take urgent decisions.”
Amid clashes last week between Syrian government forces and the SDF, Damascus accused the SDF of releasing detained ISIS members from a prison in the countryside of Hasakah, while Kurdish forces said the prison had fallen out of their control after coming under attack by government forces.
Al-Awadi explained that the decision was not taken unilaterally by the Iraqi government, but rather by Iraq’s National Security Council, which includes all security and military institutions—from the army and the intelligence and national security services to the Popular Mobilization Forces—during an official meeting held after coordination and communication with the international coalition forces.
He added that Iraq faced three options: leaving the situation as it was, with the risk of prisons being opened and detainees escaping; allowing the Syrian government to take over prison management, an option he described as difficult due to the “absence of an orderly transfer” of control from the SDF to Damascus amid ongoing clashes; or transferring the detainees to Iraq, which Baghdad considered “the best option.”
The U.S. military announced Wednesday that its forces had transferred 150 ISIS detainees from a detention facility in Hasakah, Syria, to a secure location in Iraq.
The number of ISIS detainees held by the SDF is estimated at around 7,000, most of them Iraqis and Syrians, in addition to hundreds of foreign nationals from Arab, European, and Asian countries.
Al-Awadi told Alhurra that the first batch transferred to Iraq included 150 detainees, adding that specialized Iraqi committees within the Joint Operations Command and the security and intelligence agencies in Baghdad are coordinating exclusively with the international coalition.
He said announcements regarding the size of future transfers will be made later, as well as whether Iraq will receive all detainees or only some of them.
The transfer of ISIS detainees to Iraq has sparked controversy inside the country due to fears linked to mass prison breaks by extremists in 2013, most notably the storming of Abu Ghraib and Taji prisons, when hundreds of inmates—including senior leaders of al-Qaeda at the time—escaped. Those incidents later contributed to the surge in extremist activity and the emergence of ISIS in its subsequent form.
The Iraqi government spokesperson said these concerns are “legitimate,” but stressed that Iraq’s current security and political reality is “completely different,” adding that a repeat of such scenarios is now “impossible” under existing security measures.
Al-Awadi said Iraq viewed the transfer of detainees as “the best available option to prevent any security blowback on the internal situation or along Iraq’s borders,” emphasizing that the operation is being carried out in direct coordination with international coalition forces overseeing the transfer, alongside coordination with the Syrian side on the issue.
Upon the detainees’ arrival in Iraq, the Supreme Judicial Council issued a statement Thursday confirming that the Iraqi judiciary will begin legal proceedings against the detainees “who will be received and placed in the appropriate correctional institutions.”
According to the council, the “crimes” attributed to the detainees will be documented and archived in coordination with the National Center for International Judicial Cooperation, with the aim of recording cross-border criminal activity, enhancing international judicial coordination, and preventing any suspect from escaping legal accountability.
The council stressed that all defendants, regardless of their nationality or position within the organization, are subject to Iraqi judicial authority, and that “legal procedures will be applied without exception, in a manner that preserves victims’ rights and reinforces the principle of the rule of law in Iraq.”
Earlier, a statement from U.S. Central Command said that the commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East, Gen. Brad Cooper, spoke with Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa, briefed him on the detainee transfer operation, and “expressed his hope that Syrian forces, as well as all other parties, would avoid any actions that could disrupt” the operation.
Syria announced Tuesday a ceasefire with the Syrian Democratic Forces after seizing large swaths of territory from them in the country’s northeast, giving the SDF four days to agree to integrate under the banner of the central state. The United States, the SDF’s main ally, urged the group to accept the arrangement.
The rapid advance of Syrian government forces in recent days, and the clear decline in U.S. support for the SDF’s continued control of territory, mark the largest shift in control in the country since opposition forces ousted Bashar al-Assad 13 months ago.
Reuters quoted a U.S. official on Tuesday as saying that about 200 low-ranking ISIS fighters escaped from al-Shaddadi prison in Syria, but that Syrian government forces recaptured many of them.
As the issue of ISIS detainees nears resolution through their transfer to Iraq, concerns are also growing over the fate of al-Hol camp near the Iraqi border, which had been under SDF control and has now come under Syrian government control.
The camp houses about 44,000 civilians linked to ISIS, nearly all of them women and children, most of whom are Syrians or Iraqis, though Western nationals also live there in a separate annex.
On this point, the U.S. Central Command spokesperson said he currently has no information on the matter, in response to a question about whether there are plans to transfer any of the camp’s residents to Iraq.
The Iraqi government spokesperson also said he has no information to provide at this time regarding the issue.
The article is a translation of the original Arabic.
Ghassan Taqi
A journalist specializing in Iraqi affairs, he has worked with the Middle East Broadcasting Networks (MBN) since 2015. He previously spent several years with Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, as well as various Iraqi and Arab media outlets.
