UN urges Canada to repatriate seriously ill woman detained in Syria camp
UN experts said Canadian national Kimberly Polman, who is held at Roj camp, is suffering from a host of "life-threatening illnesses".
United Nations human rights experts on Thursday urged Canada to repatriate a seriously ill Canadian woman detained at a camp in northeast Syria.
The experts said Kimberly Polman, who is being held at Roj camp, is suffering from a host of “life-threatening illnesses”, including hepatitis, kidney inflammation/enlargement, untreated Hashimoto’s disease, and bone/muscle issues.
She is also suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and other “extremely serious” mental health conditions.
Polman travelled to Syria in 2015, at a time when Islamic State (IS) group sympathisers and their families were flocking to Syria and Iraq from all over the world to join the self-proclaimed caliphate.
The UN experts said Polman headed to Syria “at the behest of her future husband whom she met online.” Her husband to be was an IS member.
“The Canadian authorities’ outright refusal to assist her so that she has urgent access to healthcare, or at the very least to facilitate the transfer of money from her family so that she is able to improve her health and living conditions, is a clear violation of her right to health and could amount to violations of the right to life and the prohibition of cruel and inhumane treatment,” they said.Despite her family’s attempts to have her brought home, Canadian authorities have refused to repatriate her or facilitate access to healthcare, the UN experts said.
Polman’s sister told Human Rights Watch that she was “easy prey”, having grown up with an abusive father “who struggled with substance use”.
Not long before her departure for Syria, Polman had lost her public housing and was seeking government welfare assistance.
HRW said Polman contacted her family soon after her arrival in Syria, telling them she wanted to leave. She was abused by her husband, who threw her in jail for months for being a disobedient wife; there she was raped and abused by her captors.
The UN experts also pointed to “the recent security developments in an extremely volatile area of Syria” as a reason to bring her back to Canada as soon as possible.
IS last month attacked a prison controlled by Kurdish-led forces. Up to 500 people were killed in the heavy fighting that ensued and scores of people are still missing.
Local authorities have since renewed their calls for countries to take back their citizens held in the camps and prisons.
Relatives of Canadians held at camps and prisons in northeast Syria held a protest on Thursday, demanding their loved ones be returned home.
Source: The New Arab
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