Dutch woman accused of enslaving Yazidi women while part of Islamic State goes on trial

A Dutch woman who joined Islamic State in 2015 went on trial in the Netherlands on Monday for crimes against humanity for allegedly enslaving two Yazidi women in Syria.

Hasna Aarab, 33, faces charges of taking part in slavery as a crime against humanity for keeping two Yazidi women as domestic slaves, between 2015 and 2016, while she lived in Raqqa with her small son and her Islamic State fighter husband.

The Netherlands is only the second country to put an alleged Islamic State member on trial for crimes against humanity against Yazidis, an ancient religious minority who combine Zoroastrian, Christian, Manichean, Jewish and Muslim beliefs.

Islamic State controlled swathes of Iraq and Syria from 2014-2017, before being defeated in its last bastions in Syria in 2019.

It viewed the Yazidis as devil worshippers and killed more than 3,000 of them, as well as enslaving 7,000 Yazidi women and girls and displaced most of the 550,000-strong community from its ancestral home in northern Iraq.

In previous cases Germany convicted two members for crimes against humanity and war crimes committed against Yazidis.

Aarab is also charged with membership of a terrorist organization from 2015 to 2022 and endangering her then 4-year old son by taking him to a war zone.

She told the court Monday that she felt alienated and depressed in the Netherlands and left Syria for a new life in 2015 but not to join Islamic State.

“I heard some stuff (but) I did not think I would have to deal with IS atrocities,” she told judges.

In earlier procedural hearings Aarab’s lawyers said she was young and naive and was left in the house with the Yazidi by her then-husband, but did not command the women. The defence will present its full case later this week.

Under Dutch universal jurisdiction laws, national courts can try suspects for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide committed on foreign soil as long as the accused have a link to the Netherlands.

(Reporting by Stephanie van den Berg; Editing by Alison Williams)