Albanian Family Pleads for Return of ISIS-held Children

Many women and children have been evacuated from the enclave to refugee camps run by Kurdish forces and the US-backed anti-government coalition Syrian Democratic Forces in anticipation of a final, bloody stand by ISIS fighters. There are indications Ndregjoni's niece and nephew may be among them, alongside other children of ISIS fighters from the Balkans.

With the children's mother, Ndregjoni's sister Mide Dumani, suffering from severe depression, Ndregjoni told BIRN he was calling on authorities in Albania and other international actors in the conflict to identify those in the refugee camps and return them to their families without delay.

"They have suffered so much and we have waited for so long," he said. "For the rest of my life I will be grateful to whoever makes this possible, Albanian or foreigner".

Xhetan Ndregjoni. Photo: Antonio Çakshiri

Dumani believed killed in 2014

A report released in March 2016 by the Albanian Institute of International Studies, AIIS, said the number of fighters from Albania joining ISIS in Syria and Iraq peaked in 2014, when between 90 and 150 people left from Albania, including 13 women and 31 children.

It is unclear how many are alive and are in the refugee camps.

Ndregjoni said no one in his family ever believed his sister's husband, Dumani, would be capable of such an act. Dumani is believed to have been killed in Syria in 2014.

"He was not only my brother-in-law but we also worked together in the contraction company for years," he told BIRN. "He was one of the most peaceful and calm people that I've ever seen. I can't imagine how he turned into an ISIS fighter."

Originally from Albania's Diber country but living in Tirana, Dumani was 39 years old when he left with his two...