One of the wives of deceased Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was sentenced to death Wednesday by an Iraqi court for allegedly helping the terrorist group detain Yazidi women.
The sentence, issued by the Karkh Criminal Court in Iraq, said that women members of the religious minority were abducted by state gangs in Iraq’s Sinjar region and held in the woman’s house.
It was part of a series of attacks that took place in August 2014. Thousands of Yazidi women were victims of human trafficking, along with other sex-based abuses. The United Nations deemed the attacks genocide.
The woman has not been publicly named, but anonymous officials within the court told The Associated Press that she is Asma Mohammed. She is reported to have been detained in Turkey in 2018 but wasn’t handed over to Iraqi officials until 2023.
The sentence was delivered in compliance with the country’s anti-terrorism and Yazidi survivors’ law. The woman is alleged to have aided and facilitated the kidnappings, with the court saying she took part in “detaining Yazidi women in her home.”
The sentence is awaiting ratification by an Iraqi appeals court, which must be done in order for it to be implemented.
Some information for this story was provided by The Associated Press and Reuters.
