BAGHDAD (AP) — Baghdad will prosecute and try militants from the Islamic State group who are being transferred from prisons and detention camps in neighboring Syria to Iraq under a U.S.-brokered deal, Iraq said Sunday.
The announcement from Iraq’s highest judicial body came after a meeting of top security and political officials who discussed the ongoing transfer of some 9,000 IS detainees who have been held in Syria since the militant group's collapse there in 2019.
The need to move them came after Syria's nascent government forces last month routed Syrian Kurdish-led fighters — once top U.S. allies in the fight against IS — from areas of northeastern Syria they had controlled for years and where they had been guarding camps holding IS prisoners.
Syrian troops seized the sprawling al-Hol camp — housing thousands, mostly families of IS militants — from the Kurdish-led force, which withdrew as part of a ceasefire. Troops last Monday also took control of a prison in the northeastern town of Shaddadeh, from where some IS detainees had escaped during the fighting. Syrian state media later reported that many were recaptured.
Now, the clashes between the Syrian military and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF, sparked fears of IS activating its sleeper cells in those areas and of IS detainees escaping. The Syrian government under its initial agreement with the Kurds said it would take responsibility of the IS prisoners.
Baghdad has been particularly worried that escaped IS detainees would regroup and threaten Iraq’s security and its side of the vast Syria-Iraq border.
Once in Iraq, IS prisoners accused of terrorism will be investigated by security forces and tried in domestic courts, Iraq's Supreme Judicial Council said.
The U.S. military started the transfer process on Friday with the first IS prisoners moved from Syria to Iraq. On Sunday, another 125 IS prisoners were transferred, according to two Iraqi security officials who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.
So far, 275 prisoners have made it to Iraq, a process that officials say has been slow as the U.S. military has been transporting them by air.
Both Damascus and Washington have welcomed Baghdad's offer to have the prisoners transferred to Iraq.
Iraq’s parliament will meet later on Sunday to discuss the ongoing developments in Syria, where its government forces are pushing to boost their presence along the border.
The fighting between the Syrian government and the SDF has mostly halted with a ceasefire that was recently extended. According to Syria's Defense Ministry, the truce was extended to support the ongoing transfer operation by U.S. forces.
The Islamic State 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.
During the battles against IS, thousands of extremists and tens of thousands of women and children linked to them were taken and held in prisons and at the al-Hol camp. The sprawling al-Hol camp hosts thousands of women and children.
Last year, U.S. troops and their partner SDF fighters detained more than 300 IS militants in Syria and killed over 20. An ambush in December by IS militants killed two U.S. soldiers and one American civilian interpreter in Syria.
Chehayeb reported from Beirut.
Men sit inside a holding room at a prison in the town of Shaddadeh, northeastern Syria, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026, after Syrian authorities said they were among Islamic State group members who escaped from the facility a day earlier and were later detained by Syrian government forces. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
An aerial view shows Shaddadeh prison complex in the town of Shaddadeh, northeastern Syria, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026, a day after Syria's Interior Ministry said Islamic State group members escaped from the facility during clashes with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
WASHINGTON (AP) — The fatal shooting of a Minneapolis protester by a federal immigration officer touched off a fierce national debate and prompted some fellow Republicans to question President Donald Trump's hard-line immigration crackdown, but the president on Sunday night continued to blame Democratic officials.
After remaining relatively quiet on Sunday, the Republican president in two lengthy social media posts said that Democrats had encouraged people to obstruct law enforcement operations. He also called on officials in Minnesota to work with immigration officers and "turn over" people who were in the U.S. illegally.
“Tragically, two American Citizens have lost their lives as a result of this Democrat ensued chaos,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social media network.
Trump's refusal to back away from his pledge to carry out the largest deportation program in history and the surge of immigration officers to heavily Democratic cities came as more Republicans began calling for a deeper investigation and expressing unease with some of the administration's tactics.
The White House did not answer questions about whether Trump watched the videos of the shooting in Minnesota, which seemed to contradict the account of what happened by members of his administration, or whether he planned to speak to Minnesota's Democratic Gov. Tim Walz, who had appealed to the president to help bring calm to the city.
Instead, Trump on Sunday night said he would call on Congress to pass legislation banning so-called sanctuary cities. His administration has sought to apply the label to communities based on their cooperation with federal immigration enforcement efforts, among other factors.
His push for action by lawmakers comes even as outrage over the shooting has raised the possibility of a partial government shutdown in a week because of a standoff over additional funding for immigration enforcement.
Trump's initial reaction to the shooting of 37-year-old Alex Pretti came hours after it took place on Saturday. In a post on his Truth Social network, he questioned why Pretti had a firearm and accused Walz and Frey of inciting "Insurrection, with their pompous, dangerous, and arrogant rhetoric.”
But throughout the weekend, Trump, who rarely lets a major moment go without comment, did not make any public appearances or express any dismay over Pretti's death.
Instead, he posted online complaining about Canada and efforts to stop him from building an expansive ballroom at the White House, calling a lawsuit to block its construction “devastating to the White House, our Country, and all concerned.”
He also posted messages praising U.K. troops after his comments about them earlier in the week were widely interpreted as a grave insult and praising guests appearing on Fox News Channel.
When he finally weighed in again Sunday night as criticism grew, Trump was unbowed.
He called on Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, also a Democrat, to turn over for deportation anyone in the country illegally who was held in state prisons or local jails, along with anyone who has a warrant out for their arrest or a criminal history.
Members of his administration, meanwhile, were quick to say the shooting, the second killing of a U.S. citizen in Minneapolis by immigration officers in recent weeks, was a case of an armed man provoking violence.
Deputy White House chief of staff Stephen Miller said in a post on social media, without offering any evidence, that Pretti was “an assassin” who “tried to murder federal agents.”
Vice President JD Vance shared Miller's post. He issued other ones blaming local officials and describing what was happening in Minneapolis as “engineered chaos” that was “the direct consequence of far left agitators, working with local authorities.”
President Donald Trump, left, is greeted by Air Force Col. Christopher M. Robinson, commander of the 89th Airlift Wing, right, after walking down the stairs of Air Force One, upon his arrival at Joint Base Andrews, Md., Thursday, Jan. 22, 2026, after returning from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.(AP Photo/Luis M. Alvarez)
