An alleged member of the Islamic State who is of German origin is facing charges of war crimes after letting a young girl reduced to slavery die of thirst, a federal prosecutor said
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A German suspect member of the Islamic State is facing charges of war crimes after federal prosecutors accused her of letting a young girl die of thirst.
Identified only as Jennifer W, the 27-year-old joined IS in Iraq in September 2014 after travelling there through Turkey and Syria.
She quickly rose through the ranks of the organisation, German prosecutors said on Friday.
It added that in 2015, Jennifer W and her husband bought a five-year-old girl and used her as a household slave in Mosul, northern Iraq.
The girl later "fell ill and wet her mattress" and W's husband chained her up outside in the heat and let her die of thirst as punishment.
“The accused allowed her husband to do so and did nothing to save the girl,” prosecutors said.
The charges were laid in December in a Munich court that processes state security and terrorism cases.
W is said to have been recruited by an IS morality squad and that she monitored women in Fallujah and Mosul.
"Her task was to ensure that women comply with the behavioural and clothing regulations established by the terrorist organisation,” the statement read.
Members of that squad circulated weapons and explosive jackets and the accused would have been paid between 70 and 100 dollars a month, the prosecutors added.
In January 2016, Turkish authorities arrested W in Ankara after she travelled there to apply for identity papers at the German embassy.
A few days later, Turkey sent her to Germany where she was allowed to return home due to a lack of actionable evidence against her.
W attempted to travel to Syria in the summer of 2018, but was arrested and detained by German police.
The date of her trial, in which she may face life in prison, is yet to be fixed.