Five Canadian children are languishing in a dismal detention camp in northeastern Syria after Ottawa refused to allow their mothers to come to Canada, a lawyer representing the families in court says.

This development marks the latest setback for Canadians among many foreign nationals in the crumbling centers established after the war-torn region was wrested from the militant group Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.

Lawyer Asia Herji said she sought temporary residency permits in February of last year for two women with Canadian children in the Roj camp, and learned last month that they were denied on security grounds.

One mother has a seven-year-old boy and a five-year-old girl. The other mother has a nine-year-old girl and boys aged seven and five. Her eldest son suffers from a serious eye condition requiring medical treatment.

And the mother is not a Canadian citizen, nor are the fathers of the Canadian children present in the families' lives.

Herji, a supervising lawyer at the legal clinic of the University of Toronto’s law school, said the women signed confessions under duress in Syria, which Canada should not rely on.

She is now seeking a judicial review in federal court of the decision to deny the Canadian permit.

She said, “In all security cases, they are extremely cautious about what they disclose to applicants.” “Thus, it leads to a very lengthy process.”

A civil society delegation that visited Syrian detention camps last August called on Ottawa to provide immediate consular assistance to detained Canadians and to quickly repatriate all citizens willing to return to Canada.

Members of the delegation, including Senator Kim Pate and former Amnesty International Canada president Alex Neve, urged the government to issue temporary permits to ensure that non-Canadian mothers and the siblings of Canadian children can travel to Canada.

The delegation stated that Canada is complicit in a serious international failure in human rights through a policy that essentially involves warehousing thousands of foreign nationals, more than half of whom are children.

A recent report by Amnesty International indicated that men, women, and children in detention facilities suffer from inhumane conditions, including in some cases beatings, gender-based violence, and torture.

The report noted that an estimated 11,500 men, 14,500 women, and 30,000 children are held in at least 27 detention centers and the Roj and al-Hol camps.

Herji said she has repeatedly requested that Global Affairs Canada facilitate medical treatment for the five Canadian children she is trying to assist, but to no avail.

She added, “I don’t think they care if they die.”

“It’s extremely painful that we are allowing this to happen, children don’t choose to be born. Therefore, it is our responsibility to do what is in the best interest of the children.”

Charlotte McLeod, a spokesperson for Global Affairs, said that the non-Canadian parents of Canadian children may apply to have their children returned to Canada without them, and the federal government assesses these requests on a case-by-case basis.

McLeod added that Canadian consular officials are still “actively engaging” with the Syrian Kurdish authorities and international organizations working in the region, as well as civil society groups to gather information and assist Canadian citizens in the camps.

“Due to privacy considerations, we cannot comment on specific cases or potential future actions.”

Herji said that for the Canadian mothers, sending their children to Canada alone is an impossible option.

“Are they subjecting their children to a lifetime of emotional trauma? Or do they keep them with them and try to protect their emotional health at the cost of their physical health?”

Canada has arranged for the return of several other Canadian women and children from detention in Syria.

A woman from Quebec was blocked from receiving help from Ottawa to return to Canada for security reasons, but she has since managed to leave the Roj camp. Her current whereabouts are unknown.

The woman’s lawyer, Lawrence Greenspon, said that Ottawa has agreed to assist her six young children, who are also citizens, in coming to Canada.

Greenspon added, “I have clear instructions from her to get her children home as soon as possible and it seems Global Affairs is moving in that direction.”

He confirmed that a specialized clinic in Montreal is “ready to intervene” to help the children as soon as they return.

As for the mother, Greenspon said, “The hope is that she can find her way to the Canadian consulate and then eventually find her way home.”

Greenspon is also one of the lawyers behind efforts in court to secure the repatriation of four Canadian men detained in Syria to their homeland.

In November, the Supreme Court of Canada refused to hear the two men's appeal of a Federal Court ruling that said Ottawa was not legally obligated to help them return.

The Supreme Court is being asked to reconsider its decision.