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  • Welcome to Euro News Tonight.

  • Turkey said it's going to start returning ISIS prisoners to their home countries whether these people are welcome or not.

  • Several European countries are facing a dilemma of what to do with former Islamic State fighters and their families who have been captured in Iraq and Syria.

  • Some British militants have had that citizenship revoked.

  • But Turkey's Interior Minister said that would not stop Ankara from sending these people back home.

  • We're telling them we'll repatriate these people to you, and we're starting as of Monday.

  • We will repatriate these people no matter what European countries do.

  • They say we revoked their citizenship. Do whatever you want with them.

  • Christina Jovanovski is following the story in Istanbul for us.

  • I asked her why Turkey is making a move like this now.

  • This week the Turkish president will be meeting with the US president in Washington for a big meeting in the White House.

  • This could possibly be leverage. Turkey has used the threat of foreign fighters, of having access to these foreign fighters against the Western allies in the past.

  • They have also used the threat of holding migrants or having arguments in their country who would want to go into Europe against the Western countries.

  • The Turkish president earlier said that, "If Europe doesn't support Turkey's plan for safe zone in which it wants to send millions of Syrians back to, then Turkey could open the gates, open the doors on migration."

  • And of course, one of the big concerns with another migration crisis would be, who exactly would be among the refugees.

  • There could of course be foreign fighters, so that would be a big concern and a big leverage that Turkey could hold although Turkey has insisted that it is helping with the fight against ISIS.

  • They had made numerous announcements in the past week stating that it had captured the wife of the former ISIS leader who is now dead, as well as his sister and brother in law.

  • And we know that, at least the wife they said, is being held in a deportation center in Turkey.

  • So, that might give a hint of what Turkey is planning to do or where they have these ISIS fighters now.

Welcome to Euro News Tonight.

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