Time is running out for Australian children trapped in Syria camps

Yet I was able to safely visit al-Roj, where Australian citizens are trapped. It’s one of two camps where thousands of women and children from Syria, Iraq and abroad live.

The temperature was in the mid-40s when I arrived. While the heat was unbearable, it was seeing the conditions of the camps that was hardest to bear.

I sat down with a group of Australian women and met many of their children.

Each mother pleaded with me to bring them home to their families and loved ones in Australia. Each declared their willingness to co-operate fully with law enforcement authorities.

I will never forget the face of an eight-year-old girl whose frame was so small and frail that she looked much smaller than my own daughter, who is just five. Her teeth were rotten or missing and she was showing signs of stunting, which indicates poor nutrition.

These camps are no place for children. I want it to be crystal clear that these women and children are Australian. It is the moral and legal responsibility of the Australian government to repatriate them.

When I left for this trip, I said goodbye to my three children, held them tight and told them I would be back in no time. And I knew they would be safe at home in Melbourne with my wife.

But the children in Syria are thousands of kilometres away from their loving extended families, with no immediate prospects of returning home to Australia where they belong.

And the reality is that many children in the camps will never go home because they are no longer with us.

Children have died in these camps waiting to go home, including 74 children in the al-Hol camp in 2021 alone. Every day that they remain in the camps, Australian children are at risk of further injury, illness or even death.

Other countries, such as Germany, Sweden and The Netherlands, have already shown it is possible to safely bring home women and children from the camps. Just last week France repatriated 51 people, including 35 children.

Even the previous Australian government brought eight orphans home, and officials have travelled to and from the camps in recent years. Clearly, where there is a will there is a way.

But the Morrison government was unwilling to do any more, despite offers from the local Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria and our allies in the US to help repatriate the Australian children and their mothers.

These children have faced incredible dangers, including coercion, trafficking, enslavement and sexual exploitation.

They are now being denied their rights to education, healthcare and freedom.

The camp administration is doing its best to support these families. But this is northeast Syria, which has been racked by conflict for a decade. Many staff servicing the camp are internal refugees themselves. Supporting foreign citizens should not be their responsibility.

Each day children spend in the camps, more harm is being done. Some have serious injuries that require immediate treatment, such as removing shrapnel, surgery that camp medical facilities are ill-equipped to carry out.

These families feel abandoned by the Australian government. State governments have appropriate support services available to manage their transition and reintegration back into Australian society. Non-governmental organisations such as Save the Children also stand ready to assist.

While in Syria I was given a ­letter by a 12-year-old girl. The last few lines remain etched in my mind.

“All I want is for me and my mum and my sisters to come home,” it read. “I want to forget about the camp, please take me out of here.”

I made a promise to myself, that I would do whatever it takes to bring them home and reunite them with their families.

This is now in the hands of the new government. It may be early in its term, but these children cannot wait much longer.

If the Labor government wants to create a positive legacy for children, let this be it. Let them bring our kids home.