German Prosecutor's Office Indicts ISIS Officials On The Genocide Case To The Yazidi Community

JAKARTA - A high-ranking Islamic State militant group in Syria has been charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity in Germany on suspicion of involvement in genocide against the Yazidi community.

The suspect, a Syrian citizen identified as Ossama A. is in accordance with Germany's privacy law, joined ISIS in the 2014 summer in the Deir ez-Zor region of eastern Syria, the German prosecutor's office said.

He is suspected of leading a local unit that forcibly seized 13 properties, mostly private property, which is used to accommodate fighters, as office space or for storage.

Two of the buildings were used by ISIS to imprison arrested women Yazidi so that fighters could sexually harass and exploit them.

"This is an integral part of the organization's goal to destroy Yazidi's religious community," the Prosecutor's office said.

The suspect was arrested in Germany in April 2024 and detained before trial.

Germany emerged as the main prosecutor of Syrian war crimes outside Syria under universal jurisdiction principles.

In early 2022, a former Syrian intelligence officer who worked in Damascus prison was jailed for life in an important trial where he was convicted of murder, rape, and sexual assault.

ISIS militants took control of large parts of Iraq and Syria from 2014-2017 before being defeated by Western-led coalition forces and defeated in their last stronghold in Syria in 2019.

ISIS sees Yazidi, an ancient minority religion, as a cultivator and killing more than 3,000 of them, as well as beating up 7,000 women and daughters Yazidi and displacing most of the 550,000 communities from their ancestral homes in northern Iraq.