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Ashwaq is full. During the last five years she has suffered and struggled to achieve a judicial milestone that opens a slit to hope for thousands of Yazidi women who, like her, were raped and turned into sex slaves of the militants of the self-styled Islamic State. His testimony, the first heard in an Iraqi court, has served to condemn the man who stole his adolescence to death.

"I wanted to go to court to see the criminal confined in a cage and I would also like to see him when he is hanged. I have asked to attend the hanging, " says Ashwaq, 21, in an exclusive conversation with THE WORLD. A court in Baghdad on Monday handed down capital punishment against Abu Hamam, the 36-year-old jihadist of Iraqi nationality who raped her for two months until she could escape her claws and reunite with her family.

In his condemnation - the first for the crimes of rape of a woman from the Yazidi minority, a follower of a faith linked to Zoroastrianism that mixes elements of ancient Mesopotamian religions with the Christian and Muslim creeds - the story of Ashwaq, which -a Unlike other victims - he agreed to speak to the magistrates and in the presence of his executioner about the torments to which he was subjected after being bought for "100 or 200 dollars" in the Iraqi city of Mosul.

"I went to the court and saw the terrorist. I felt happy. I had been waiting for that day for five years. And thanks to the Iraqi intelligence services I was finally able to fulfill my dream," the twenty-year-old mutters, who broke up last December. another taboo when faced with Abu Hamam on a television show on the Iraqi state network. The prosecution began in early 2019 when his father received a call from the secret services informing him of the arrest of a member of the IS (Islamic State).

"We want to talk to Ashwaq," a voice communicated on the other side of the telephone line. The young woman, who was in Germany participating in the psychological assistance program received by hundreds of survivors of IS sexual trafficking , returned to Iraq and faced her past. Landed in Baghdad, Ashwaq did not hesitate when he was shown the photograph of the arrested man, with whom he had crossed into German lands.

At first sight, five detainees in yellow overalls paraded through the room. Nor then did the victim doubt the identity of the man who subdued her . "I could be your daughter's age, why did you do this to me and ruined my life?" The young woman shot at him. "I told all my story to the judge and half a hundred representatives from the United States and Europe who attended the sessions. My story and that of my friends and sisters," he says.

At the beginning of August 2014, the then teenager - she was barely 14 years old - was kidnapped along with her six sisters in the vicinity of Mount Sinyar , the home in northwest Iraq of the Yazidi minority that the jihadists consider "devil worshipers." He then began a journey that took her through the confines of the caliphate, from Mosul and Tel Afar to neighboring Syria. Two weeks later, Abu Hamam - one of Baghdad who had escaped from prison after an assault orchestrated by the IS - began to indoctrinate them in the Muslim faith, before his forced conversion.

"One day he came and said: 'You must marry me.' I cried and tried to dissuade him. I told him how he could rape me when he was so young. But it was all in vain. He raped me the same," says Ashwaq, who has not forgotten martyrdom. . "He raped me daily, sometimes two or three times on the same day." Horrified with the idea of ​​becoming pregnant, she pretended to be sick and, once in the hospital, begged the doctor to provide her with birth control pills. It was in the clinic where he also found the remedy to organize the escape: it was done with sedatives and, together with other companions, he included them in a meal prepared for caliphate acolytes.

When they satiated the hunger and the dream overcame them, Ashwaq undertook the warp escape through a mobile phone that he had managed to hide and with which he communicated with his family during captivity. Accompanied by other victims, she traveled 40 kilometers on foot. " We crossed a dangerous route. We suffered hunger and thirst and we were afraid to be captured again but we were anxious to regain freedom," says the protagonist of the feat.

" My daughter was kidnapped on August 3, 2014 and she was released on October 22. During that time the family made a great effort to help her," her father tells this newspaper, who disbursed $ 15,000 to free five of his offspring. "I am proud to have been able to bring to court the person who destroyed my life. I did not do it only for myself but also to restore the rights of all Yazidi girls and women," the young woman says.

Mega judgments

Until now, judicial prosecution against jihadists and the extensive string of crimes committed throughout the caliphate had been weighed down by megajudgments of which international human rights organizations have denounced the absence of guarantees . In the case of the kidnapping and systematic violation of the Yazidis, the Iraqi courts had not issued any specific sentence. Nor is international justice, where the general cause for the Yazidi genocide is still far away.

The stigma carried by the victims and the fear of repudiation from their own communities had aborted any attempt at accountability. Ashwaq's bravery now opens the door to other women who share the same pain. During the hearing, Abu Hamam - Mohamed Rashid's name of war - simply said that he had received the young woman "as a gift" from his superiors.

Of the 6,700 Yazidis kidnapped, the whereabouts of some 3,000 are still unknown . Those who returned and survived their captors or suicide attempts are undergoing an uncertain recovery, abroad or in camps for displaced persons raised in the autonomous region of Iraqi Kurdistan.

There, in his geography of shops, Ashwaq inhabits since his return from Germany. 39 relatives, including a sister and five brothers, are still missing. The hope of finding them is increasingly fragile. The IS lost its last enclaves last year and, since then, has embraced the insurgency. "There are other criminals like Abu Hamam in prisons. We have to bring them to justice so that the punishment they deserve falls on them, " replies the first survivor who paraded to a court.

" Now I want to train. I study English two days a week, " says the twenties, who before her abduction helped in a beauty salon in her town and aspired to be a nurse. "I don't have dreams anymore. I'm just looking for justice for all the raped Yazidi girls," he says while confessing he feels he has finally closed the darkest stage of his biography. "Thank God, I've got justice for me."

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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