About 2,600 ISIS terrorist suspects arrested in Kurdistan Region

According to a Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) official on Wednesday, over 2,500 Islamic State (IS) suspects have been arrested by the Kurdistan Region security forces in the past three years.

Dindar Zebari, the KRG’s Head of the Committee to Evaluate and Respond to International Reports, announced that Kurdish security forces managed to arrest 2,652 IS suspects across the Region in the past three years.

Among the arrested IS suspects, 1,110 were convicted on charges of collaborating with the extremist group and have received sentences between three years to life in prison, Zebari said during a press conference.

Zebari stated that 870 of the suspects had been released while 672 others remain in custody due to continued investigations on their cases.

The KRG official said all the suspects had been well treated and had the right to acquire a lawyer to defend themselves before the court.

The Kurdish official also revealed that 675 of the suspects were arrested in Erbil, 35 in Sulaimani, and 1,594 in Dohuk.

He did not mention any figures regarding IS suspects detained in Kirkuk, a disputed territory between the KRG and Federal Government of Iraq which is currently under the control of Peshmerga forces.

“The court procedure for the suspects involved in terror activities are held in the Kurdistan Region’s Investigation and Crime Court, and [suspects are] charged in accordance with the 2006 Counter-Terrorism Law,” Zebari concluded.

Source: Kurdistan