Alleged Islamic State terrorist on trial in Netherlands for war crimes

A Dutch-born alleged Islamic State militant went on trial in the Netherlands on Monday for war crimes committed in Iraq and Syria, after posing with a crucified body and sharing images of dead victims online.

It is the first trial in the Netherlands dealing with war crimes committed by an alleged Islamic State militant.

There is no international tribunal to prosecute the widespread atrocities committed during Syria’s civil war, which began in 2011, but several European countries have put citizens who joined militant groups in the Middle East on trial.

According to the European police agency Europol, some 5,000 Europeans went to fight in Syria and Iraq, of whom some 1,500 have returned. Roughly 300 Dutch men and women joined the war in Iraq and Syria, prosecutors said.

Oussama Achraf Akhlafa, 24, is charged with joining IS militants in Mosul in Iraq, and Raqqa in Syria, between 2014 and 2016.

He is being tried under so-called universal jurisdiction, which enables war crimes to be prosecuted regardless of where they were committed.

Akhlafa is charged with violating the personal dignity of war victims, which is protected under the 1949 Geneva Conventions, as well as membership of a terrorist organisation. Prosecutors demanded a prison sentence of seven years, eight months.

Prosecutors said Akhlafa had posed next to the crucified body of a man on a wooden cross and distributed pictures of an IS militant holding the head of a dead Kurdish fighter, and of a dead woman with the foot of someone standing on her body.

A list of fighters on Islamic State’s payroll recovered in Mosul names Akhlafa as one of 18 Dutch nationals, said prosecutor Nicole Vogelenzang.

Source: Reuters