“Sixty-eight juveniles [since last year] have been held prisoner in our jail,” Zaki Salih Musa, head of Duhok’s Juveniles and Women Reforms Center, told Rudaw. “Of which 45 were arrested on charges of terror and a number of them are Kurds including Shabak Kurds, some from other areas recently liberated from ISIS.”
Musa highlighted of the risks of being under ISIS rule for minority groups like Shabaks and Yezidis, some of whom practice faiths and rituals, which don’t coincide with the beliefs of ISIS.
“A Yezidi is also among the arrestees who has converted [his religion] to Islam in Mosul," he said.
Some of the juveniles still do not denounce ISIS.
“Those who have been arrested on charges of terror are not feeling remorseful and they are still proud of being ISIS. I have been working in this reforms center for 15 years, all the arrestees have had expressed regret for their crimes," Musa added these ISIS child soldiers never did.
ISIS proudly dubs its child soldiers ‘The Lion Cubs of the Caliphate.’
Musa urged the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and international organizations to open awareness and psychological workshops for these juveniles to help them cope.
A prisoner who has been jailed along with these juveniles spoke to Rudaw about their conduct.
“The Kurds are good,” said the prisoner, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “Some of them regret to have worked [with] and joined ISIS, but the Arabs are very extreme.”
The prisoner talked about a fellow inmate who seems isolated and traumatized.
“[He] rarely speaks and he said that ISIS had fed him the flesh of human beings,” the prisoner added, explaining that due to the small size of the reforms center, those charged with terror and others on various charges are mixed together.
But Abduljabar Abdulrahman, a social researcher in Dohuk, deemed it as dangerous.
“Those juveniles arrested on the charges of being ISIS should not be mixed with other criminals,” Abdulrahman said.
.jpeg&w=3840&q=75)