Norway picks up orphans from Syria camp
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirms that Norway has taken an orphaned child with a Norwegian father from an IS camp in Syria. The child was taken out in a secret operation on Monday, writes VG.
Foreign Minister Anniken Huitfeldt (Labor Party) confirms on government websites that the Norwegian authorities are in the process of retrieving an orphaned child who has stayed in a camp in Syria.
– The child had a Norwegian father. The father-child relationship is established through DNA and the child is therefore considered a Norwegian citizen. The child is under school age and is going to Norway, says Huitfeldt.
according to VG, which first wrote the case, was conducted on Monday in the city of Qamish in Rojava in northern Syria.
It is the child’s father who was Norwegian, gets VG confirmed. This means that this is a different type of case for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs than the cases of the four Norwegian IS women in Syrian camps, who together have four children.
High priority for the government
The newspaper writes that the child, who has been transferred from Kurdish self-government authorities to Norwegian personnel from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Armed Forces, is on his way to Norway via Iraq.
– In Norway, the child will receive the follow-up and care he needs and the assistance that may be necessary from the child welfare service and possibly other authorities, says Huitfeldt.
She says the case has been a high priority after the Norwegian authorities became aware of the case this spring. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs does not wish to provide further information about the child or the trip to Norway. This is so as not to contribute to the identification of the child.
– I ask everyone to respect that the child should be protected, that it is not identified and that it should come to Norway with the greatest possible peace around it. It provides the best basis for shaping one’s own life here, says the Minister of Foreign Affairs.
– More should be brought to Norway
Save the Children is happy that the child will be brought to Norway, and hopes that more can follow.
– We testify that the Norwegian authorities will bring home the remaining children and their mothers, says director Gunvor Knag Fylkesnes for politics and communication in Save the Children.
Norway has legal obligations towards these children, Knag Fylkesnes points out.
– For us, it is completely unacceptable that the Norwegian authorities knowingly and intentionally allow Norwegian children to be left in what is referred to as torture-like conditions, and allow them to be punished for something they have not done. Now they must be allowed to come home before it is too late, she says.