Germany investigating Islamic State crimes against Yezidis
(dpa)
Mannheim, Germany - German prosecutors are investigating five cases in which suspected Islamic State members were involved in atrocities against the Yezidi minority when the militant group controlled Iraq, dpa has learned.
The investigations are still in a preliminary stage: No charges have been made, no one has been questioned and no searches have been carried out.
Women who travelled from Germany to join Islamic State in Syria and Iraq are the focus of the investigation, Bayrische Rundfunk, a regional media outlet, reported.
Details about the investigations were first revealed in a government response to a question posed by lawmakers from the Left Party.
Female Islamic State members participated in enslaving Yezidi women and girls, and were just as likely to have been involved in torture and killing as men, said Ulla Jelpke, a Left Party spokesperson.
Islamic State jihadists massacred Yezidi men and boys - and enslaved women and children - in 2014 when they overran the Sinjar area of Iraq where many members of the religious minority lived.
Baden-Wuerrtemberg took in some 1,000 female Yezidis, including Nadia Murad - who has since become a Nobel laureate - a member of Iraq's Yezidi religious minority who survived sexual slavery at the hands of the extremist group.
The Yezidis follow an ancient religion which combines Zoroastrian, Gnostic and Islamic elements. They have long suffered persecution, partly because aspects of their faith have been misinterpreted as devil worship.
Women who travelled from Germany to join Islamic State in Syria and Iraq are the focus of the investigation, Bayrische Rundfunk, a regional media outlet, reported.
Details about the investigations were first revealed in a government response to a question posed by lawmakers from the Left Party.
Female Islamic State members participated in enslaving Yezidi women and girls, and were just as likely to have been involved in torture and killing as men, said Ulla Jelpke, a Left Party spokesperson.
Islamic State jihadists massacred Yezidi men and boys - and enslaved women and children - in 2014 when they overran the Sinjar area of Iraq where many members of the religious minority lived.
Baden-Wuerrtemberg took in some 1,000 female Yezidis, including Nadia Murad - who has since become a Nobel laureate - a member of Iraq's Yezidi religious minority who survived sexual slavery at the hands of the extremist group.
The Yezidis follow an ancient religion which combines Zoroastrian, Gnostic and Islamic elements. They have long suffered persecution, partly because aspects of their faith have been misinterpreted as devil worship.
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