Three Kenyan girls return home after escaping ISIS captivity in Libya

Three girls who had left Kenya to join ISIS in Libya have been brought home.

The three girls, Firthoza Ali Ahmed, Aisha Mafudh Ashur and Tawfiqa Dahir Adan, were rescued in the streets of Cairo, Egypt trying to find their way to the Kenyan Embassy in Egypt, after escaping their captors in Benghazi, Libya.

Firthoza says she was job hunting online when she was contacted by someone known as Umm Mariam on Twitter.

Umm Mariam seemed to know her well from the questions she asked. She also knew that Firthoza was looking for a job.

JOB DESPERATION

Thereafter, Umm Mariam offered to help get her a job in other parts of the world, especially Europe, urging that they paid their employees well. Consumed with the desperation of getting a job, she accepted Umm Mariam’s help.

Firthoza, did not have travel documents, but Mariam, assured her, that she knew people who could fix her problems, so she should not worry.

That is how the trio was lured to embark on a dreadful journey to Libya, to Join ISIS.

The safe return of the girls to the country is the successful efforts of the multiagency security approach employed by the Kenyan government in conjunction with other foreign governments to prevent the youth from leaving the country and to track those who have left and bring them back home.

Sources say that, many youth fighting for terror groups in Somalia, Libya and Syria, have reached out to the government to seek for amnesty.

SPYING ON TERROR GROUPS

They have expressed their willingness to cooperate with the government in the fight against terrorism. Most of the Kenyans fighters are being executed for spying on the terror groups.

The girls joining the group suffer the most because they are exposed to inhumane treatment, where they are sexually abused and beaten up if they resist.

Many girls die within weeks of getting into the militia controlled territory as a result of the adverse conditions they are subjected to. For instance, while there, the girls are treated as communal wives, to serve all the fighters at the battle front.

Psychologists opine that parents have a huge stake to play in the fight against radicalization into the terrorism.