‘Daesh allowed me to rape 200 women in Iraq’

Daesh militant Amar Hussein says he has raped more than 200 women from Iraqi minorities, and shows few regrets.

Kurdish intelligence authorities gave Reuters rare access to Hussein and another Daesh militant who were both captured during an assault on the city of Kirkuk in October that killed 99 civilians and members of the security forces. Sixty-three Daesh militants died.

Hussein said his emirs, or local Daesh commanders, gave him and others a green light to rape as many Yazidi and other women as they wanted."Young men need this," Hussein told Reuters in an interview after a Kurdish counter-terrorism agent removed a black hood from his head. "This is normal."Hussein said he moved from house to house in several Iraqi cities raping women from the Yazidi sect and other minorities at a time when Daesh was grabbing more and more territory from Iraqi security forces.

Kurdish security officials say they have evidence of Hussein raping and killing but they don't know what the scale is.Reuters could not independently verify Hussein's account.

Witnesses and Iraqi officials say Daesh fighters raped many Yazidi women after the group rampaged through northern Iraq in 2014. It also abducted many Yazidi women as sex slaves and killed some of their male relatives, they said.

Human rights groups have chronicled widespread abuses by Daesh against the Yazidis.Hussein said he also killed about 500 people since joining Daesh in 2013.

"We shot whoever we needed to shoot and beheaded whoever we needed to beheaded," said Hussein.

He recalled how emirs trained him to kill, which was difficult at first when one person was brought for a practice kill. It became easier day by day."Seven, eight, ten at a time. Thirty or 40 people. We would take them in desert and kill them," said Hussein, an imposing, well-built figure, who was wearing metal handcuffs.Eventually, he became highly efficient, never hesitating to kill.

"I would sit them down, put a blindfold on them and fire a bullet into their heads," he said. "It was normal."

TROUBLE

Counter-terrorism agents said Hussein was trouble when he first arrived. "He was so strong he snapped the plastic handcuffs off his wrists," said one.

Hussein sees himself as a victim of hardship, a product of a broken home and poverty in his hometown of Mosul, where Iraqi forces have launched an offensive against Daesh to dislodge them from their last stronghold in Iraq.

"I had no money. No one to say 'This is wrong, this is right.' No jobs. I had friends but no one to give me advice," said Hussein, who has been held in the cell with a barred window since his capture in October.

Religious slogans are scratched on its cement walls by previous jihadist prisoners. His only possessions are a thick blanket and a Quran. On the floor is a polystyrene plate with broth and some rice.Thick, metal handcuffs hang on a nearby wall.

Twenty-one-year-old Hussein joined extremist groups at the age of 14.

Counter-terrorism agents described a second prisoner, Ghaffar Abdel Rahman, as less forthcoming, and said he had revealed little during questioning about his experiences as a checkpoint and logistics man for Daesh.

Abdel Rahman, 31, with long hair and beard and a blank stare, gave little away in a separate interview with Reuters.

He admitted to opening fire on security forces in the raid on Kirkuk but says he never killed anyone. He said he and his brother joined Daesh because otherwise, as state employees, they would have been killed by the group.

His Kurdish captors did not comment on his story, but Iraqi authorities are generally sceptical of fighters who say they had no choice.

Daesh 'rapes and tortures Sunni Arab women too': HRW

Islamic State (Isis) tortured, raped and forcibly married many Sunni Arab women living under their rule in Iraq, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a report on Monday (20 February), citing recent interviews of six victims in Kirkuk.

One woman said she was raped by her own cousin who was an IS (Daesh) fighter, while the others were abused and tortured by random militants in control of their towns. They added that victims like them were in hundreds in IS-controlled areas of Iraq.

The Sunni-dominated militant group is known for brutalities against non-Sunni Muslims like Shias and people belonging to other religions such as Yazidis and Christians. However, this is the first time such cases of abuse against Iraq's Sunni Arab women have come to light, HRW said.

The international charity that fights human rights abuses called for support for these victims as federal governments have so far been focusing on providing medical aid rather than on psychological and counselling facilities.

Citing the interviews from January 2017, the HRW report said four women told them they were tortured while in detention in 2016. They said they were held captive for varying durations - from a few days to a month.

Another woman told the charity that she was forced to marry her IS fighter cousin who used to rape and beat her regularly. Yet another woman said she was tortured and her house destroyed because her husband had escaped IS rule. She added that she was forced to marry an IS fighter but she refused and was abused as a punishment.

One of these women said she was captured by IS men in April 2016, while she was trying to escape Hawija with her three children and a large group of other families. She added that around 50 women from the fleeing group were held in an abandoned house. She was raped by a militant every day in front of her children over the next month, she said, adding that the other captive women too might have gone through the same ordeal.

"Little is known about sexual abuse against Sunni Arab women living under Isis rule," Lama Fakih, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, said. "We hope that the international community and local authorities will do all they can to give this group of victims the support they need."

A foreign aid worker told the non-governmental group that many women who face abuses by IS men do not even report the matter to their families for fear of being punished or stigmatised. Children born out of rapes are also often hidden from family members or communities as they too would face the same stigma as the mothers.

All the interviewed victims are patients at the Kirkuk Centre, where doctors are providing them medical and psychological support. Dr Abd al-Karim Kalyfa, who runs the centre, reportedly said in January that the facility was treating 30 patients at that time, 15 of whom were children suffering from trauma related to their life under IS rule. He had then stressed on the need for mental health care facilities in the IS-liberated towns and cities.

"Isis victims of gender-based violence suffer the consequences of their abuse long after they have managed to escape." Fakih said, adding: "Their care and rehabilitation requires a multifaceted response, with authorities providing the needed medical and psychosocial support and working to stamp out stigma around sexual violence within the wider community."