Two Dutch foreign terrorist fighters were sent back to their country, the Turkish Interior Ministry announced Saturday. The Netherlands prosecution office indicated in a written statement that a woman, who had gone to Syria by crossing Turkey, had been taken into custody Saturday evening.
In the statement, it said that the 28-year old woman that went to Syria in 2013 with her 4-year-old child had contacted the Netherlands Consulate General in Ankara on Oct. 30 this year. The child was later taken into protective custody.
The Interior Ministry stated also that the repatriation process of foreign terrorist fighters continues.
Turkey began setting about repatriating captured Daesh terrorists after the interior minister warned last month that Ankara would do so even if the prisoners had had their citizenship revoked.
Some 287 Daesh terrorists have been captured in northeastern Syria, where Turkish troops launched an anti-terror operation in October. Hundreds remain in detention as suspects. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Nov. 8 that there were currently 1,201 Daesh terrorists in Turkish prisons.
Turkey has criticized Western countries for refusing to repatriate their citizens who joined Daesh in Syria and Iraq, stripping some of them of their citizenship. Although the 1961 New York Convention made it illegal to leave people stateless, several countries including France have not ratified it, and recent cases have triggered prolonged legal battles. The U.K. alone has stripped more than 100 people of their citizenship for allegedly joining terrorist groups abroad.
Turkey has been actively conducting counterterrorism operations against Daesh since 2016. Since then, 4,517 of the 13,696 suspects detained in 4,536 operations have been arrested. Over the course of the operations, 1,018 terrorists were either killed, injured or surrendered. In order to apprehend Daesh suspects, 64 risk analysis units that include experts on terrorism and intelligence were formed across the country. The units regularly monitor suspects that operate within their region as well as all other developments regarding the terrorist group, both within and outside the country.