Aussie Kurd trapped in Iraqi refugee camp under ISIS seige finally reaches home

An Australian man flew back to Melbourne on Saturday morning after being trapped in an Iraqi refugee camp for nine months, following threats from ISIS.

Renas Lelikan was also released after being questioned for almost 12 hours by the Australian Federal Police (AFP) after landing in Melbourne. He was supposed to return to Australia about two weeks earlier but some problems with his Iraqi travel documents led to the delay.

"It wasn't easy living under the threat of the IS terrorists," he told the ABC. "The whole world knows what they do. [But] you can't just look at yourself being freed because there are thousands of people that still live there under the threat of Daesh terrorists."

Lelikan holds a joint Kurdish-Australian passport and is Kurdish by origin. He was trapped at the Makhmur camp in northern Iraq, which housed Kurdish refugees fleeing the Turkish government. The camp has been attacked by the Islamic State a number of times. Lelikan had told the ABC that the attacks were quite frequent, counting up to once or even twice a week.

He had reportedly been refused a passport by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade earlier over suspicions that he might have links to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). According to the ABC, Lelikan was possibly allotted temporary travel documents that enabled him to fly to Australia.

"I am not [a threat]," he said. "My whole life I have never felt sorry [for what I did]. It was right. I never did anything against our Australian Government. Wherever I went I did my job as a journalist."

His lawyer Jessie Smith said Lelikan’s return to Australia is a great news and she is relieved that the journalist is finally away from the constant threats by ISIS forces. According to The Australian, Lelikan had been working as a journalist for Iraq-based news agency Rojev since 2011, before the Syrian civil war. He also previously worked for German-based Kurdish outlet Mezopotamya News Agency, and Turkish and Kurdish publications.

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