The decision to move IS prisoners from Syria to Iraq came at the request of Baghdad, officials say

BAGHDAD (AP) — The decision to move prisoners of the Islamic State group from northeast Syria to detention centers in Iraq came after a request by officials in Baghdad that was welcomed by the U.S.-led coalition and the Syrian government, officials said Thursday.

American and Iraqi officials told The Associated Press about the Iraqi request, a day after the U.S. military said that it started transferring some of the 9,000 IS detainees held in more than a dozen detention centers in northeast Syria controlled by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF, in northeast Syria.

The move to start transferring the detainees came after Syrian government forces took control of the sprawling al-Hol camp — which houses thousands of mostly women and children — from the SDF, which withdrew as part of a ceasefire. Troops on Monday seized a prison in the northeastern town of Shaddadeh, where some IS detainees escaped and many were recaptured, state media reported.

The SDF said on Thursday that government forces shelled al-Aqtan prison near the northern Syrian city of Raqqa with heavy weapons, while simultaneously imposing a siege around the prison using tanks and deploying fighters.

Al-Aqtan prison, where some IS prisoners are held, was surrounded by government forces earlier this week and negotiations were ongoing on the future of the detention facility.

Early Friday, Syria's defense ministry announced an “internationally sponsored agreement” had been reached for withdrawal of some 800 SDF fighters who had been inside the prison, with the facility to be handed over to the Syrian army.

On Thursday, U.S. envoy to Syria Tom Barrack had met with SDF leader Mazloum Abdi in Irbil, the capital of Iraq's semi-autonomous northern Kurdish region.

With the push by government forces into northeast Syria along the border with Iraq, Baghdad became concerned that some of the detainees might become a danger to Iraq’s security, if they managed to flee from the detention centers amid the chaos.

An Iraqi security official said that the decision to transfer the prisoners from Syria to Iraq was an Iraqi decision, welcomed by the U.S.-led coalition and the Syrian government. The official said that it was in Iraq’s security interest to detain them in Iraqi prisons rather than leaving them in Syria.

A senior U.S. military official confirmed to the AP that Iraq “offered proactively” to take the IS prisoners rather than the U.S. requesting it of them.

A Syrian foreign ministry official said that the plan to transfer IS prisoners from Syria to Iraq had been under discussion for months before the recent clashes with the SDF.

All three officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to comment publicly.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio in a statement applauded Iraq's “initiative to detain ISIS terrorists in secure facilities... following recent instability in northeast Syria.” He said non-Iraqi prisoners would be held temporarily and urged other countries to repatriate their citizens.

Over the past several years, the SDF has handed over to Iraqi authorities foreign fighters, including French citizens, who were put on trial and received sentences.

The SDF still controls more than a dozen detention facilities holding around 9,000 IS members, but is slated to hand the prisons over to government control under a peace process that also is supposed to eventually merge the SDF with government forces.

U.S. Central Command said that the first transfer on Wednesday involved 150 IS members, who were taken from Syria’s northeastern province of Hassakeh to “secure locations” in Iraq. The statement said that up to 7,000 detainees could be transferred to Iraqi-controlled facilities.

Iraq has beefed up patrols along its border with Syria. On Thursday, tanks lined up along the frontier in the northern province of Sinjar.

Members of the Yazidi minority in Sinjar have been particularly fearful of a repeat of 2014 when IS militants overran the area and launched brutal attacks on Yazidis, considered by the extremist group to be heretics. Militants killed Yazidi men and boys and sold women into sexual slavery or forced them to convert and marry militants.

IS declared a caliphate in 2014 in large parts of Syria and Iraq, attracting large numbers of fighters from around the world.

The militant group was defeated in Iraq in 2017, and in Syria two years later, but IS sleeper cells still carry out deadly attacks in both countries. As a key U.S. ally in the region, the SDF played a major role in defeating IS.

Also Thursday, the SDF accused the government of violating a four-day truce declared on Tuesday. It said Syrian government forces pounded the southern outskirts of the northern town of Kobani, which recently became besieged after the government’s push in the northeast over the past two weeks.

A commander with the Kurdish women’s militia in Syria, speaking from inside Kobani, told reporters during an online news conference that living conditions there are deteriorating.

Nesrin Abdullah of the Women’s Protection Units, or YPJ, said that if the fighting around Kobani continues, thousands of people “will be massacred.”

She said that there was no electricity or running water in the town, which a decade ago became the symbol of resistance against IS. The militants at the time besieged it for months before being pushed back.

“The people here are facing a genocide,” she said. “We have many people in hospitals, and hospitals cannot continue if there is no electricity.”

U.N. Assistant Secretary-General Khaled Khiari told the U.N. Security Council Thursday that clashes were taking place in parts of Hassakeh province and also on the outskirts of Kobani, an enclave controlled by the SDF, and that the situation on the ground elsewhere was “very tense."

Abby Sewell reported from Beirut. Omar Sanadiki in Damascus, Syria, Bassem Mroue in Beirut, and Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations, contributed to this report.

A soldier observes a prison room after Syrian government forces took over the town from the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), in Tabqa, eastern Syria, Sunday, Jan. 18, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)

Iraqi Border Guards deploy along the Syrian border amid heightened security following recent fighting in Syria, in Sinjar, northern Iraq, Thursday, Jan. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Farid Abdulwahed)

Iraqi Border Guards patrol in armored vehicles along the border with Syria, in Sinjar, northern Iraq, Thursday, Jan. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Farid Abdulwahed)

Iraqi Border Guards patrol along the border with Syria, in Sinjar, northern Iraq, Thursday, Jan. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Farid Abdulwahed)

Iraqi Border Guards patrol in armored vehicles along the border with Syria, in Sinjar, northern Iraq, Thursday, Jan. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Farid Abdulwahed)

Local youth play atop of a damaged armored vehicle belonging to the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) at the site of clashes with Syrian government forces in the village of al-Hol in northeastern Syria's Hasakeh province, Syria, Wednesday, Jan. 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — French President Emmanuel Macron and South Korean President Lee Jae Myung agreed Friday to work together to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz and ease global economic uncertainties caused by the war in the Middle East.

Their summit in Seoul came as U.S. President Donald Trump slammed allies for not supporting the U.S. and Israeli war against Iran. Macron was making his first visit to South Korea since taking office in 2017, as part of an Asian tour that already has taken him to Japan.

Macron told Lee at the start of the meeting that the two countries can play a role in helping to stabilize the situation in the Middle East, including Iran’s chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz, which has unleashed shock on global energy markets.

At a joint televised briefing afterward, Macron underscored the need for France and South Korea to cooperate to help reopen the strait and deescalate Middle East animosities, while Lee said the two affirmed “their resolves to cooperate to secure the safe shipping route in the Strait of Hormuz.”

The two leaders did not take questions and did not elaborate on how they would help reopen the strait — the narrow waterway between Iran and Oman through which about one-fifth of the world’s oil usually passes.

“We need to clearly define, at the international level, the conditions for a process to ease the crisis and conflict in the Middle East,” Macron said. “We need to ensure that the Strait of Hormuz is reopened.”

Lee said he and Macron agreed to expand cooperation in technology, energy and other areas. South Korean and French officials also signed agreements to cooperate on nuclear fuel supply chains, jointly invest in an offshore wind project in southern South Korea and to collaborate on critical minerals. South Korea has moved to increase output at its nuclear reactors to mitigate the energy crunch and Lee has also called for a faster transition to renewable energy, saying the war has exposed the country’s heavy reliance on fossil fuel imports.

Macron’s Asia trip comes as Trump has ramped up his frustration with allies. In a speech Wednesday, Trump said Americans “don’t need” the strait but the countries who do “must grab it and cherish it.”

In an earlier Easter event at the White House, Trump called for his allies in Asia and China to get involved in reopening the waterway.

“Let South Korea, you know, we only have 45,000 soldiers in harm’s way over there, right next to a nuclear force — let South Korea do it,” Trump said. “Let Japan do it. They get 90% of their oil from the strait. Let China do it.”

The United States stations about 28,000 troops in South Korea, not the 45,000 stated by Trump. The U.S. troops’ deployment in South Korea is meant to deter potential aggressions from North Korea.

Macron has said reopening the Strait of Hormuz through a military operation is unrealistic.

South Korean officials have said they are in contact with Washington on the issue and that Seoul isn’t considering paying Iran transit fees to secure fuel shipments through the strait.

French President Emmanuel Macron, front left, his wife Brigitte Macron, back center, and South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, front right, and his wife Kim Hea Kyung, right, attend the welcome ceremony at the presidential Blue House in Seoul Friday, April 3, 2026. (Jung Yeon-je /Pool Photo via AP)

French President Emmanuel Macron, center, his wife Brigitte Macron, left, and South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, right, and his wife Kim Hea Kyung, second left, attend the welcome ceremony at the presidential Blue House in Seoul Friday, April 3, 2026. (Jung Yeon-je /Pool Photo via AP)

French President Emmanuel Macron, second left, talks with South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, second right, during their meeting at the Blue House in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, April 3, 2026. (Jung Yeon-je/Pool Photo via AP)

French President Emmanuel Macron shakes hands with South Korean President Lee Jae Myung during their meeting at the Blue House in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, April 3, 2026. (Jung Yeon-je/Pool Photo via AP)