MIA source: Iraqi and Syrian militants hold hundreds of Chechen children and women

Reports of the Middle Eastern and European media about Chechen female suicide bombers and homeless children confirm the assumption of a source from the Chechen Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) about the large number of Chechen children and women in the conflict zone. The laws stipulate taking a child out of Russia with the consent of only one of the parents, a lawyer reports.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on July 16, social networks disseminated a video record in which Iraqi soldiers demonstrated a Chechen boy captured during the fights for the city of Mosul. In 2015, after the divorce of his parents, the boy was taken in secret from his mother to Syria (according to other sources, to Iraq) by his father who joined the organization "Islamic State" (IS) banned in Russia. The boy's mother addressed the Prosecutor's Office of Chechnya with an appeal to help return her son home.

Hundreds of Chechen children and their mothers can be kept in the ranks of the IS militants in Iraq and Syria, a source from the Chechen MIA reports. He knows names of several young women who can now be in Iraq or Syria with their children.

According to Iraqi media, after the release of the city of Mosul from the militants, a group of Chechen children came under the care of the Ministry for Labour and Social Relations of Iraq.

Family members of the militants who now stay in Iraq and Syria say they want to return their children and grandchildren home.

According to Isa, the imam of a Grozny Mosque, the militants, who left for Syria and Iraq together with their families, violated the provisions of the religion.

Wives and children of Chechens who joined the ranks of the militants in Syria and Iraq need help to return to their homeland, members of local NGOs believe.

Full text of the article is available on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’.