woman picked up from IS camp had Yazidi as a slave

According to the Public Prosecution Service, a woman who was taken back by the Netherlands from an IS camp in Syria had a Yazidi woman as a slave. That would have happened in 2015 in Syria. The woman is suspected of slavery, a crime against humanity.

According to the Public Prosecution Service, this is the first time that someone in the Netherlands has been tried for a crime against Yazidis, an ethnic and religious minority in northern Iraq.

The suspect was picked up by the Netherlands from a prison camp in Syria last November, together with eleven other women and their 28 children. They were arrested after arrival and are suspected of committing terrorist crimes because, according to the OM, they were suspected members of the Islamic State.

In May last year, the court in Rotterdam ruled that the women had to be brought to the Netherlands quickly, otherwise their criminal case would be terminated.

The first preparatory sessions against the twelve women will be held in Rotterdam on Tuesday and Wednesday. Because it concerns an international crime, the case will be heard by the District Court of The Hague.