UN: Islamic State group still has thousands in Syria and Iraq

The Islamic State group still commands between 5,000 and 7,000 members across its former stronghold in Syria and Iraq and its fighters pose the most serious terrorist threat in Afghanistan today, UN experts said in a report circulated Monday, Report informs, citing ABC.

The experts monitoring sanctions against the militant group, also known by its Arab acronym Daesh, said that during the first half of 2023, the threat posed by IS remained “mostly high in conflict zones and low in non-conflict areas.”

But the panel said in a report to the U.N. Security Council that “the overall situation is dynamic,” and despite significant losses in the group's leadership and reduced activity in Syria and Iraq, the risk of its resurgence remains.

Northeast Syria is also the site of two closed camps – al-Hol and Roj – where the experts said some 55,000 people with alleged links or family ties to IS are living in “dire” conditions and “significant humanitarian hardship.”

Approximately two-thirds of the population are children including over 11,800 Iraqis, nearly 16,000 Syrians and over 6,700 youngsters from more than 60 other countries, the experts said.

The panel quoted one unnamed country as saying Daesh has maintained its “Cubs of the Caliphate” program, recruiting children in the overcrowded al-Hol camp.

In Afghanistan, the panel said U.N. members assess the Islamic State group poses the most serious terrorist threat to the country and the wider region. IS has reportedly increased its operational capabilities and now has an estimated 4,000 to 6,000 fighters and family members in Afghanistan, it said.