National Security Minister Stuart Young said on Sunday that information in the public domain about T&T nationals who left to join ISIS must first be verified but acknowledged that some of the evidence was disturbing.
He was responding to a report carried by Amandla Thomas-Johnson in the Middle East Eye (MEE). Young said the ministry was scrutinising all data to ensure there was verification before taking any action.
The report stated that over 100 Trinidadians, including children, were being held in an overcrowded Al-Hol camp in northern Syria.
“As Minister of National Security, I am ensuring that the relevant authorities are conducting verification and information gathering exercises and I will say that some of the evidence obtained so far with respect to some Trinidadians who went to join ISIS is very disturbing.”
He assured that the ministry will be acting in the best interest of T&T’s nationals.
“The lens of National Security is one that must take in all of the various matters and circumstances, many of which are not being broadcast in public, and balance it all in favour of the public’s interest,” Young said.
He added, “There is a concerted effort and agenda being pushed to portray persons who are in war zones and exposed to ISIS philosophy and training in a certain innocuous manner.”
“At National Security, rest assured that we will continue to act responsibly and based on facts and evidence using, inter alia, Team Nightingale to ensure that the best decisions and actions are taken in the public’s interest.”
Team Nightingale was formed in 2018 and includes, the Financial Intelligence Unit, the Terrorist Interdiction Unit, the Financial Investigation Branch, the Child Protection Unit, the Anti-Terrorism Desk, Ministry of the Attorney General and Legal Affairs, the Children’s Authority, the Counter-Trafficking Unit, the Anti-Money Laundering/Combating the Financing of Terrorism Compliance Unit, and the Intelligence Services.
In the report carried by MEE, Thomas-Johnson said: “Trinidad-based families have been lobbying the government for months, in an effort led by Felicia Perkins-Ferreira, who rescued her two children from the neighbouring Al-Roj camp in January.”
She said a detailed list compiled by the families was shared with MEE and offers an insight into the Trinidadian nationals held at Al-Hol, “who arrived as part of an exodus of people fleeing the capturing of Islamic State group territory by a US-backed military campaign spearheaded by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) earlier this year.”
It is believed that 25 women and 71 children of T&T were at the camp as of the start of November, while previous reports said there were only 25. At least 130 Trinidad and Tobagonian nationals went to Iraq and Syria between 2013 and 2016. Many of the fighters were killed in battle.