UNICEF inspects Sina prison in Hesekê

UNICEF representative Bo Victor Nylund calls for international engagement for the interned minors after a visit to the Sina prison in Hesekê. This demand has been made by the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria for years.

A delegation of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) visited the Sina prison in Hesekê on Saturday to check on the conditions of the interned minors. The detention centre held 4,100 Islamists belonging to ISIS armed units at the time of the attempted storming by ISIS on 20 January. About 700 minors were in a separate block used as a rehabilitation centre. These boys, aged under 18, were given military training and ideological indoctrination in the ISIS youth organisation "Cubs of the Caliphate" before their internment.

According to the press office of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the delegation led by Bo Victor Nylund, UNICEF's representative in Syria, was briefed on the situation in the prison and in particular of the minors.