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A burnt-out vehicle is seen next to the ISIS group's flag on the outskirts of the Syrian city of Raqqa on June 11, 2017. Photo: AFP
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A French court has charged the ex-wife of a top Islamic State (ISIS) leader with genocide and crimes against humanity for allegedly exploiting a teenage Yazidi girl in Syria, French media reported on Saturday.
Sonia M., 34, is an ex-wife of top ISIS official Abdelnasser Benyoucef. She was charged on March 14 by a Paris judge for “genocide” and “crimes against humanity,” Le Parisien said. “This French woman, now targeted with the most serious qualifications of the Penal Code, is accused of her alleged involvement in the martyrdom of the Yazidi community, the non-Muslim Kurdophone religious minority methodically persecuted by Daesh [ISIS].”
The court suspects her of having enslaved a Yazidi girl in her Raqqa apartment,
The Yazidi woman was 16 when she was enslaved by Benyoucef. She accused Sonia M. of rape and said she had knowledge that her husband was also raping her, according to the report.
On her time in Syria, the Yazidi woman also said she was not allowed to eat, drink, or shower without informing Sonia M.
ISIS swept through vast swathes of Syria and Iraq in 2014 and declared a so-called “caliphate” in a brazen offensive that saw the group take control of around a third of Syria’s territory as well as several Iraqi cities, including the second largest northern city of Mosul. It was declared territorially defeated in 2017 and 2019 in both countries respectively.
During the jihadists’ brutal reign, they committed heinous atrocities, such as genocide, sexual slavery, and massacres against non-Muslims, especially the Yazidi ethnoreligious group. Christians and Shiite Muslims were also a target.
More than 6,000 Yazidis were abducted when ISIS overran the community’s heartland of Shingal (Sinjar) in 2014. Around 2,700 remain missing, with little done to bring solace to the rescued.
Earlier in April, Germany detained an Iraqi couple suspected of being members of ISIS and accused of enslaving and sexually abusing two young Yazidi girls.
Sonia M., 34, is an ex-wife of top ISIS official Abdelnasser Benyoucef. She was charged on March 14 by a Paris judge for “genocide” and “crimes against humanity,” Le Parisien said. “This French woman, now targeted with the most serious qualifications of the Penal Code, is accused of her alleged involvement in the martyrdom of the Yazidi community, the non-Muslim Kurdophone religious minority methodically persecuted by Daesh [ISIS].”
The court suspects her of having enslaved a Yazidi girl in her Raqqa apartment,
The Yazidi woman was 16 when she was enslaved by Benyoucef. She accused Sonia M. of rape and said she had knowledge that her husband was also raping her, according to the report.
On her time in Syria, the Yazidi woman also said she was not allowed to eat, drink, or shower without informing Sonia M.
ISIS swept through vast swathes of Syria and Iraq in 2014 and declared a so-called “caliphate” in a brazen offensive that saw the group take control of around a third of Syria’s territory as well as several Iraqi cities, including the second largest northern city of Mosul. It was declared territorially defeated in 2017 and 2019 in both countries respectively.
During the jihadists’ brutal reign, they committed heinous atrocities, such as genocide, sexual slavery, and massacres against non-Muslims, especially the Yazidi ethnoreligious group. Christians and Shiite Muslims were also a target.
More than 6,000 Yazidis were abducted when ISIS overran the community’s heartland of Shingal (Sinjar) in 2014. Around 2,700 remain missing, with little done to bring solace to the rescued.
Earlier in April, Germany detained an Iraqi couple suspected of being members of ISIS and accused of enslaving and sexually abusing two young Yazidi girls.
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