The Hague District Court convicted Dutch national Hasna A of multiple crimes she committed after traveling to Syria in 2015 to join ISIS. She had taken her then four-year-old son with her and married an ISIS fighter who put a Yazidi woman in her service, reported Dutch media.
Hasna A, 33, has been tried for enslaving two Yazidi women but the court convicted her only for charges related to one of them, who was referred to as Z for her privacy. It concluded that the evidence provided for the second woman’s case, referred to as S, was not enough to charge Hasna A with.
In its verdict, as seen by Rudaw, the court ruled on four grounds: the enslavement of a Yazidi woman and making her work in Syria, membership of ISIS, committing terrorist acts and endangering the lives of her children in a dangerous area.
When ISIS swept through the Yazidi heartland of Shingal in August 2014, committing genocide, the group abducted 6,417 women and children who were forced into labor and sexual slavery.
More than 2,000 Yazidis abducted by ISIS a decade ago remain missing, Hussein Qaidi, head of the Office for Rescuing Abducted Yazidis, told Rudaw on Monday when announcing that a Yazidi woman had been rescued from ISIS captivity in Syria’s Idlib province.
Many have been rescued from al-Hol, the notorious camp that houses tens of thousands of ISIS families and supporters. Others have been found in areas of Syria controlled by rebels or Turkish-backed armed groups, and some have been located in third countries.
“Partly because of people like her I have lost two daughters. She has hurt me very much,” German media cited Z as saying during the trial. She spoke through a translator.
Hasna A was among a group of 12 Dutch women and their 29 children who were repatriated from the Kurdish-held northeast Syria (Rojava) in May 2022. She has been detained since then but her children have been kept in child protection facilities.
Rojava authorities have repeatedly called on governments to take responsibility for their citizens, but most Western nations are reluctant to repatriate nationals who may be a security risk due to their links with ISIS. Most countries repatriate on a case-by-case basis, prioritizing children.
The Wednesday trial was the first one brought by prosecutors in the Netherlands for violations of Yazidi rights.
