Overview
- The Munich Higher Regional Court is trying an Iraqi married couple accused of buying, enslaving, exploiting and sexually abusing two Yazidi girls as part of Islamic State.
- Testifying through tears, the 20-year-old witness told the court, “I was bought and sold by six men,” and said she could not look at the accused when asked to identify him.
- She described being inspected as her veil was removed, being mocked with the words “Buy her, she has not been raped yet,” then forced into household labor, raped at night and beaten on the soles of her feet.
- Germany’s Federal Public Prosecutor has charged the pair with war crimes and crimes against humanity, and the court scheduled four days for the witness’s examination.
- According to prosecutors, the male defendant lived in Munich for more than a decade as an asylum seeker before traveling to Iraq in 2015 to join IS, as the case unfolds against the backdrop of IS atrocities against Yazidis documented by UN Unitad, including 68 mass graves.