Iraq holds 1,400 foreign family members of IS fighters at camp near Mosul

The Iraqi authorities detained some 1,400 foreign wives and children of suspected Islamic State (IS) fighters at a camp near the newly-freed city of Mosul in northern Iraq, a government official said on Sunday.

"The security forces are interrogating the detainees in a detention camp in Hammam al-Alil, some 50 km south of Mosul, to determine the identities of their countries as many of them no longer had their original documents," Jasim al-Attiyah, undersecretary of the Minister of Displacement and Migration, told Xinhua.

A security source in Mosul told Xinhua "the nationalities of the detainees vary from Russia, Turkey to other countries of Europe and Asia."

"They are wives and children of Daesh (IS) militants who are either killed in the battles in Tal Afar with Iraqi forces or surrendered to the Iraqi forces and the Kurdish Peshmerga forces," the source said on condition of anonymity.

On Aug. 31, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi declared full liberation of the city of Tal Afar and surrounding areas from the extremist IS militants.

source: Xinhua