RNA - According to Foreign Policy, in early August, fighters from the Islamic State swept into the small Yazidi village of Maturat in Iraq’s Sinjar district and took women to the Badush prison in Mosul. Hundreds more women and girls were herded into an ancient citadel in the town of Tal Afar in the northern province of Nineveh.
From Tal Afar, a group of 150 unmarried girls and women, mostly from Christian or Yazidi families, were selected and reportedly sent to Syria “either to be given to ISIL fighters as a reward or to be sold as sex slaves,” according to a report released Thursday by the United Nations’ human rights office in Iraq.
The Islamic State, also known as ISIS and ISIL, captured the world’s attention last June by declaring the creation of a caliphate in parts of both Syria and Iraq and embarking on a ruthless military campaign marked by mass executions, beheadings and ethnic cleansing of ancient Christian, Shiite and Yazidi communities.
The report described two instances in which women tried to fight back against Islamic State militants, prompting deadly reprisals.
On Aug. 21, when Islamic State fighters began beating women in a Mosul market for refusing to wear veils, some women threw stones at their attackers, according to the report. Four days later, the bodies of three women who had been shot and tortured were found west of the city.
According to witnesses cited in the report, Islamic State fighters dumped more than 60 Turkmen and Yazidi children in an orphanage in Mosul after they had witnessed the killing of their parents by the fighters. “It appears some of the older children may have been physically and sexually assaulted,” the report notes. “Later, ISIL fighters returned to the orphanage and made the children pose with ISIL flags so they could take photos of them.”
Militants are recruiting children as young as 12 to fight for the Islamic State, the report said, and witnesses in Mosul have seen children between the ages of 13 and 16 on patrol alongside the militants.
“Witnesses reported that these children wear similar attire to that of ISIL gunmen, and sometimes wear masks or kaffiyeh over their faces,” the report said. “Children were seen carrying weapons, sometimes too big for them to carry.”
These child soldiers are also used for propaganda, as the report notes that photos of their training have been posted on social media sites and other websites.
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