Yusuf was trafficked into Islamic State territory as a boy – now the Australian faces a ‘vague and chaotic’ situation
While Yusuf is believed to be trapped in Iraq’s opaque prison system, hundreds of kilometres away, his mother remains in a Syrian detention camp with other Australian families
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About 460km from where his mother and sister remain trapped in a Syrian detention camp, Yusuf Zahab – trafficked from Australia into Islamic State territory at around the age of 12 – is believed to be held inside Iraq’s opaque prison system.
He was a child, and never a combatant, during the reign of IS’s so-called caliphate. He was separated from his mother after the fall of Baghuz in 2019 and has spent the remaining years in Syrian prisons – surviving bombings, beatings, and tuberculosis – before he was transferred to Iraq this month.
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