About half of all offenders related to scam cases who were arrested in Singapore are in their youth, Law and Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam said on Tuesday (April 5). “The number of youths below the age of 30 who were arrested for scam-related offences jumped from 237 in 2019 to 509 in 2020, before decreasing slightly to 493 in 2021,” he added. These offenders “generally involved youths acting as money mules”, Mr Shanmugam wrote in reply to a parliamentary question.
Mr Melvin Yong, Member of Parliament (MP) for Radin Mas, had asked the minister on the number of young people who were caught for their involvement in scams last year as well as whether there was a rising trend of youth being involved in such crimes. The MP also asked about what is being done to educate and prevent youths from being lured into joining scam syndicates. Earlier in February, the police arrested 13 people aged between 19 and 22 for their involvement in a spate of high-profile phishing scams involving OCBC bank between December last year and January. The scams led 790 OCBC customers to lose a total of S$13.7 million to the scammers. Read more at: https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/youth-form-about-half-all-scam-related-offenders-arrested-singapore-shanmugam-1865081
EXTRICATING NDONESIAN CHILDREN FROM ISIS INFLUENCE ABROAD
Indonesia urgently needs to revisit the possibility of repatriating the neediest of its young citizens stranded abroad, whose families had earlier joined ISIS. Most of these children are in camps in northern Syria but there are also small numbers in the Philippines, Afghanistan and Iraq. “Extricating Indonesian Children from ISIS Influence Abroad”, the latest report from the Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict (IPAC) argues that the government could begin by bringing back small groups of unaccompanied children under ten years of age, who pose minimal security risk and are most vulnerable to deteriorating conditions in the camps.“The problem is that health and security conditions are worsening by the day in the Syrian camps, and the children are growing older,” says Dyah Kartika, IPAC analyst. “They need access to schools, a nurturing environment, and medical attention. If the government waits too long, the children will be further exposed to ISIS ideology.” The new report examines a 2019 list of Indonesians in camps and prisons run by the Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The Indonesian government has been trying to verify their citizenship, but with pseudonyms, misspellings and bad transliterations, it is a daunting task. At the time the data was collected, between March and June 2019, there were 555 Indonesians in SDF camps and prisons, including 367 children. Among the children, approximately 277 were under the age of ten and 34 were unaccompanied. In June 2021, there are fewer than ten children who are both unaccompanied and under the age of ten that could be prioritized for return. Bringing back children of ISIS families is no easy task. The report analyses the main challenges faced by the Indonesian government. These include definitional issues, bureaucratic competition, the difficulty of verifying nationality, evaluating the toll of exposure to conflict, assessing security risk, and finding relatives or others willing to provide care once the children are returned. In addition, COVID has meant stringent restrictions on travel, placing further obstacles in the way of repatriation. There are several models for rehabilitation of children exposed to violent extremism in Indonesia that could be modified to accommodate the needs of children repatriated from abroad. The report examines these models and argues that the government does not need to have every detail of rehabilitation programs in place before it starts extricating children from ISIS influence. It can start by bringing back the most vulnerable children and then modify programs as needed.
“It’s important that the government see these children as victims” says Dyah. “They deserve a chance to be children again.”
