Trigger warning: Article includes details of child abuse

The Munich Higher Regional Court has convicted an Iraqi couple of enslaving two Yazidi girls and for being members of the Islamic State group (IS). The couple enslaved two Yazidi girls between 2015 and 2017. At the same time, IS systematically trafficked thousands of Yazidi women and children into slavery as part of its persecution of the religious minority.

Sold at 5 years old in a Mosul market

Twana H.S. and his wife, Asia R. A., named in line with German privacy rules, became members of the ISIS in Iraq between October 2015 and December 2017. Prosecutors said that Twana purchased the five-year-old Yazidi girl at a slave market in Mosul in 2015 at his wife’s request. The couple purchased the twelve-year-old two years later in 2017.

The couple forced both girls to perform household work, and childcare. They also prevented them from practicing their religion and treated them as property. Prosecutors said the man “repeatedly raped both children,” while his wife “put make-up on one of the girls” and facilitated the abuse.

The BBC reports:

The children were beaten, sometimes with solid objects. On one occasion, Asia R. A. “scalded the younger girl’s hand with hot water,” prosecutors said.

The older survivor testified in court, and described beatings, forced labor, and repeated rapes. The younger girl remains missing.

The court sentenced Twana H.S. to life imprisonment. The charges included genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and the severe sexual abuse of children. Asia R.A. received a juvenile sentence of nine and a half years being under the age of 21 when the crimes occurred.

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