WASHINGTON, Dec 13: The United States views Kazakhstan’s efforts to repatriate its nationals who joined the Islamic State (banned in Russia) and other terror groups abroad as an example for the world to follow, the US State Department said in a statement after US Under Secretary of State Nathan Sales and Kazakh Foreign Minister Mukhtar Tileuberdi met earlier.
“They discussed the US-Kazakhstan counterterrorism partnership and Kazakhstan’s global leadership to repatriate its ISIS [Islamic State]-fighter citizens from Iraq and Syria, noting how Kazakhstan’s groundbreaking efforts to repatriate, prosecute and reintegrate foreign terrorist fighters is an example for the rest of the world to follow,” the statement said on Thursday.
The return of foreign fighters has gained in importance in the aftermath of the defeat of the Islamic State defeat. US President Donald Trump has urged European and other countries to take back thousands of their citizens who had joined the terrorist organization and got captured in Syria and Iraq.
Sales commended Kazakhstan’s work to share its experiences in multilateral fora, including the Central Asia countries and the United States format, better known as the C5+1.
The State Department said in the statement that Sales and Tileuberdi also discussed “China’s repressive policies against ethnic and religious minorities in Xinjiang.”
In late August of 2018, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination reported that China held large number of ethnic Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in political “reeducation camps” in Xinjiang without charging or trying them under the pretext of countering terrorism and religious extremism. The Chinese foreign ministry has rejected the claims as unfounded and untrue.
(agencies)
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