Swedish woman accused of war crimes in ISIS trial
The prosecution in Stockholm has charged a 52-year-old supporter of the Islamic State (IS) with crimes against humanity and war crimes committed against the Yazidi minority in Syria between 2014 and 2016. This is the first such case in Scandinavia.
Sep 20, 2024 | updated: 10:46 AM EDT, September 20, 2024
Born into a Christian family in Iraq but raised in Sweden, Lina I. will face trial for crimes that include, among other things, the torture of children. According to the Polish Press Agency, in her home in Raqqa, the informal capital of the self-proclaimed IS caliphate, she held nine people, including women and children, for several months.
"Women, children and men were regarded as property and subjected to being traded as slaves, sexual slavery, forced labor, deprivation of liberty and extrajudicial executions," said prosecutor Reena Devgun.
In her home, Lina I. had weapons and a belt with explosives, which she used to threaten her victims. The woman denies all charges.
The trial is set to begin on October 7 at 7:00 AM Eastern Time and is expected to last about a month. In 2022, Lina I. was sentenced in Sweden to three years in prison for taking her 12-year-old son to Syria and allowing him to be recruited by IS. The boy was an IS soldier from 2013 to 2016 and died in the war at the age of 16.
Sweden. The woman's views became radicalized
According to the newspaper "Expressen," the woman played in a first-league women's soccer club in Sweden when she was 19. She later moved to the United Arab Emirates, where her views became radicalized. She then moved to the United Kingdom. In 2013, Lina I. traveled with her then-husband and five children to Syria, where she joined IS. After her husband died in the war, the woman became involved with another man and had more children.
The IS supporter returned to Sweden in 2020. In Sweden, the woman was investigated for unlawfully receiving benefits from the public social security system while abroad. Still, the case was dismissed due to the inability to determine her place of residence.
