Iraq PM: half of IS families detained near Mosul are Turkish

BAGHDAD (AP) - Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi says Turkish nationals make up half of the 1,333 women and children being held in a camp near Mosul for suspected links to the Islamic State group.

In an exclusive interview with The Associated Press Saturday, al-Abadi says many of those detained are not guilty of any crime and his government is "in full communication" with their home countries to "find a way to hand them over."

So far, al-Abadi said, Iraq has only repatriated fewer than 100 people.

Iraqi forces are holding hundreds of IS families at a camp for displaced people in northern Iraq after they surrendered to Kurdish forces at the end of August. That's when an Iraqi offensive drove the extremist group from the northern town of Tal Afar, near Mosul.