In Munich, an exemplary trial for crimes against humanity against the Yazidi minority

A German, member of the jihadist group EI was sentenced to ten years imprisonment by a Munich court for war crimes on October 25, 2021. AFP - SVEN HOPPE

Text by: Pascal Thibaut Follow

3 min

More than 5,000 men of all ages murdered, over 7,000 women and children abducted and enslaved: the Kurdish-speaking minority of northern Iraq, the Yazidis, have been the victim of massive persecution by the jihadists of the Islamic State organization.

In 2014, a young German joined the ranks of ISIS.

She was sentenced on October 25, 2021 in Munich for "

" at the end of one of the first trials of this type. 

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,

Jennifer Wenisch, who is now 30 years old, decided in 2014 to join in Iraq those she calls " 

 " after a conversion to Islam. She is part of a sort of morality police and checks, armed with a Kalashnikov and a jacket filled with explosives, that the women comply with the new rules in force, all for a few tens of dollars a month.

In the spring of 2015, she married an Iraqi against whom further proceedings were taking place in a court in Frankfurt.

Jennifer Wenisch is not interested in household chores.

Her husband then bought her two slaves, a mother and her five-year-old daughter, both from the Yazidi minority.

They are regularly mistreated.

One day, the husband ties the little one who is ill, has urinated on a mattress to a window in the sun.

The girl is dying of thirst.

Her mother, whom she implores, can do nothing.

Jennifer Wenisch does not intervene.

She said during the trial that her husband could have " 

 ". 

An arrest in Ankara by the Turkish services

Jennifer Wenisch was arrested in Turkey in early 2016 and then extradited to Germany.

But she was not arrested until two years later while trying to join the Islamic State organization in Syria.

A driver she trusts actually works for the FBI.

She tells him what happened to the Yazidi girl.

Microphones are in the car.

She was arrested even before she left Germany.

The Munich court uses the recordings as evidence.

They allow the opening of the trial which will have lasted a total of two and a half years. 

The mother of the girl who died of thirst is now a refugee in Germany.

She lives under police protection and has testified several times.

She was notably defended by Amal Clooney, wife of actor George Clooney. 

A war crime trial against the Yazidis

The trial ended on Monday, October 25.

It is one of the first trials against crimes committed against the Yazidi minority.

It is exemplary in several ways.

First of all, because it was able to take place despite the difficulties.

But also because it is not an international criminal court before which the leaders of the Islamic State organization would answer for their act.

If this trial proves that this genocide with a penalty for crimes against humanity does not go unpunished, it is only one of the cases among thousands of others.

That of a broken, illiterate mother who lost her husband, her eldest son, her parents and a five-year-old daughter.

Only her youngest son brings her back to life.

At the Munich court, she saw an indifferent defendant, but will have the satisfaction of seeing her sentenced to ten years' imprisonment.

A German-Tunisian woman was sentenced a year ago.

Two other German women are suspected of crimes against humanity against the Yezedia minority.

► To read also: A German from the EI group sentenced to ten years in prison for the murder of a little Yazidi

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