Munich Court Delivers Justice for Enslaved Yazidi Girls

German court convicts Iraqi couple of enslaving – A German judicial body has reached a significant verdict, finding an Iraqi couple guilty of enslaving two young Yazidi girls within Iraq’s borders. The Munich Higher Regional Court determined that both defendants were also members of the Islamic State organization during the period of their crimes.

Sentences and Charges

The husband, identified in court documents as Twana H.S. according to German privacy regulations, received a life sentence. His conviction encompasses multiple serious charges, including genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and the severe sexual abuse of minors. His wife, Asia R.A., was given a juvenile sentence of nine and a half years, as she was under twenty-one years of age when the offenses occurred. Both individuals were apprehended by authorities in Bavaria during 2024. The Yazidi community, a Kurdish-speaking minority group, suffered extensive persecution following the Islamic State’s territorial expansion across Syria and Iraq beginning in 2014. When jihadist fighters invaded the Yazidi ancestral homeland in northern Iraq, thousands of men lost their lives while women and children were subjected to enslavement and sexual violence. Germany officially recognizes these systematic atrocities as genocide.

The Couple’s Journey to Iraq

Twana H.S. initially arrived in Germany during the early 2000s seeking asylum. He established himself in Munich working as a hairdresser and fathered a child. According to reports from Der Spiegel magazine, his asylum application was rejected, yet he received permission to remain in the country as the parent of a German citizen. Following radicalization at a local Munich mosque, he returned to Iraq in 2015. Prosecutors established that Twana H.S. and Asia R.A. married in Iraq under Islamic law and joined the Islamic State between October 2015 and December 2017. The Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office characterized their actions as part of a broader campaign aimed at destroying the Yazidi religion.

The Enslavement and Abuse

According to court testimony, the couple acquired their first slave in autumn 2015. Twana H.S. purchased a five-year-old Yazidi girl at a bazaar in Mosul, fulfilling a request from his wife. In early October 2017, they bought a second girl, who was twelve years old at the time. Prosecutors presented evidence that Twana H.S. repeatedly raped both children. His wife participated in the abuse by applying makeup to one of the girls and preparing the room for her husband. The enslaved girls were compelled to perform household duties and childcare while being forbidden from practicing their own faith. Physical punishment was common, with the girls beaten using solid objects. In one particularly cruel incident, Asia R.A. scalded the younger girl’s hand with hot water.

Trial and Testimony

The trial took place in Germany under the principle of universal jurisdiction, which permits prosecutions for war crimes and genocide committed abroad. During proceedings, the eldest Yazidi girl provided harrowing testimony about beatings, forced labor, and repeated sexual assaults, as reported by BR News. The second girl remains missing to this day. In her final statement, Asia R.A. offered an apology, simply saying “I’m sorry.” She is now separated from her former husband. Twana H.S. chose not to speak during the trial. The verdict represents an important step in holding perpetrators accountable for crimes against the Yazidi people, whose suffering has been recognized internationally as genocide.