Humanitarian mission headed to Syria — but it won't repatriate detained Canadians
CBC
A Canadian humanitarian mission that includes a senator will travel to northeastern Syria in the hope of visiting Canadians detained in Kurdish prison camps — but Ottawa will not let them repatriate the prisoners.
Sen. Kim Pate, former Canadian diplomat Scott Heatherington and former Amnesty International Canada secretary general Alex Neve will travel to Syria in late August to inspect Kurdish prisons in the region and speak with detained Canadians to assess their health and well-being.
The mission members originally wanted to go to Syria in late May to lead a delegation focused on repatriating the Canadians — they said Global Affairs Canada (GAC) turned down the proposal. The humanitarian mission hopes to head to Syria in late August and its member say they're still open to the government designating it a repatriation delegation before then.
Ottawa has not repatriated four Canadian men the Kurdish-led Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES) has imprisoned in Syria. The men have not been charged with a crime.
One of the detained Canadians is Jack Letts, who travelled to the Middle East in 2014. Letts was born in Oxford, U.K., but the British government revoked his citizenship in 2019. Letts has Canadian citizenship through his father.
Sally Lane, Letts's mother, has insisted that her son did not join ISIS during his time in the Middle East.
In a letter to Lane from GAC director general of consular operations Victoria Fuller, obtained by CBC News, Fuller said the Canadian government has not received confirmation from Kurdish authorities that Letts is alive.
"As anyone entering the country faces a high-threat environment, the Government of Canada continues to advise against all travel to Syria, and therefore does not endorse any non-governmental travel into Syria," Fuller wrote in the letter.
"As has been the case with past repatriations, any travel required to support future repatriation efforts will be limited to Government of Canada officials."
But the government's lack of repatriation efforts has drawn criticism from human rights organizations, the Kurdish authorities and others.
"I represent the chamber of sober second thought in the Senate of Canada," Pate told a news conference Thursday.
"Sadly, it would appear that very little sober second thought has gone into the policies which govern our government's response to the plight of Canadians detained and abandoned in northeast Syria."
Pate expressed concern about conditions at the camps, saying she's heard reports of malnourished children eating sand and prisoners languishing in sunless, cramped dungeons.
But Pate, who has spent nearly four decades working on issues involving Canada's penal system, said she's confident the group can make progress on repatriation.
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