By Canadian Press

Lawyer blasts Ottawa for ‘preposterous’ delay in assessing Canadian woman in Syria

Apr 5, 2023 | 12:03 PM

OTTAWA — A lawyer working to bring a Quebec woman home from a Syrian prison camp along with her six children says it is “preposterous” that her departure is being held up by the government’s failure to complete her security assessment.

Lawyer Lawrence Greenspon says he has asked Global Affairs Canada to take the necessary, urgent steps to allow the mother to come home with her young children.

The Canadians are among the many foreign nationals in Syrian camps run by Kurdish forces that reclaimed the war-torn region from the extremist Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

Greenspon says while the six children have been cleared to board a flight with other Canadians expected to leave Syria soon, their mother has been told she cannot join them because her security assessment is incomplete.

He says the reason is not credible, given that Global Affairs said in writing late last November that the woman and her children had met the criteria for federal consideration of assistance to Canadians detained in the region.

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Greenspon says he has enlisted a United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in the effort to repatriate the woman.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 5, 2023.

The Canadian Press