SDF chief Mazloum Abdi urged US-led coalition to ‘bear responsibilities’ for securing facilities coming under gov’t control.
Syrian government forces have entered the vast Al-Hol camp housing thousands linked to ISIL (ISIS) after Kurdish forces who had been controlling the facility for years withdrew.
Armoured vehicles carrying troops moved into the camp, located in the desert region of Hasakeh province, on Wednesday. The peaceful transfer of control suggests that the four-day ceasefire between the government and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), announced the previous day, appears to be running smoothly.
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The transfer of control of the camp, which houses some 24,000 people – mostly women and children linked to ISIL – came after two weeks of fighting between the army and the SDF that was brought to a halt by Tuesday’s truce.
The fighting has seen the SDF, which played a major role in defeating ISIL in alliance with a United States-led international coalition, lose swathes of north and east Syria.
The Kurdish forces had controlled the territories during the chaos of Syria’s civil war, which ended in December 2024 with the fall of former President Bashar al-Assad’s regime.
The government of President Ahmed al-Sharaa in Damascus, which toppled al-Assad and is now replacing the SDF as the US’s key partner in the battle against ISIL, wants the Kurdish fighters to integrate into the Syrian state. That process may now get under way should the ceasefire hold.
Tom Barrack, the US envoy to Syria, said in a statement on Tuesday that the SDF’s role as the primary anti-ISIL force had “largely expired” and that the government in Damascus is “both willing and positioned to take over security responsibilities”.
Earlier this week, President al-Sharaa and SDF chief Mazloum Abdi had agreed that the Syrian state would take over responsibility for ISIL prisoners.
Abdi on Tuesday urged the US-led coalition to “bear its responsibilities in protecting facilities” holding ISIL members.
Largest ISIL camp
Al-Hol is the largest camp for people with links to ISIL, which was defeated in Syria in 2019.
The camp was established by Kurdish forces after they took control of swathes of Syria, with coalition backing.
Those held at al-Hol include about 14,500 Syrians and nearly 3,000 Iraqis.
Some 6,500 others, many of them loyal ISIL supporters who came from around the world to join the armed group, are separately held in a high-security section of the camp.
The SDF remains in control of the vast majority of more than a dozen prisons where some 9,000 members of ISIL have been held for years, according to The Associated Press.
The largest facility, holding about 4,500 ISIL-linked detainees, is the Gweiran Prison, located in the city of Hasakeh, which is still under full control of the SDF.
On Tuesday, the Syrian Interior Ministry said 120 ISIL members escaped from the Shaddadi prison in Hasakeh province.
The army accused the SDF of releasing ISIL detainees from the facility, while the Kurds said they lost control of the facility after an attack by Damascus.
Since then, many of the detainees who fled were captured by government troops who took control of the jail, state media reported.
