“This approach is inadequate to the task of providing a real accounting of the crimes that ISIS committed – which Iraqis deserve – and fails the test of fairness and justice…” the rights monitor stated in its report Flawed Justice: Accountability for ISIS Crimes in Iraq.
Iraqi and Kurdish authorities have detained thousands of ISIS suspects and are relying on counterterrorism courts for prosecution, Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported after months of interviews with victims and judicial authorities in the country.
Under the counterterrorism laws, judicial authorities need to only prove the suspect was a member or affiliate of ISIS. This is being largely done through confessions and some written witness testimony, HRW found.
Victims are not being informed of trials, asked to participate, share testimony, or given the opportunity to question suspects.
One Nineveh judge told HRW he would discourage victim participation because it overburdens the system. There is also the logistical problem as many victims have not yet returned home, but are still displaced.
Therefore “the ongoing trials seem to be doing little to convince victims that justice is being served,” HRW stated.
Some of the militant group’s most horrific crimes were committed against the Yezidi minority. Mass killings, abductions, and enslavement of Yezidis by ISIS has been labelled a genocide.
Yet HRW reported it was not aware of a “single trial by the KRG or by the government of Iraq of an ISIS suspect for specific crimes committed against a Yezidi individual.”
The KRG established a committee to gather evidence of crimes committed by ISIS, largely though not limited to the Shingal area that is home to many Yezidis. The area is now under Iraqi control and the KRG committee told HRW it has not turned over any of its information because there is no legal authority in Iraq with jurisdiction over the crimes it was investigating.
Iraq established a Judicial Investigation Board for Crimes Against Yezidis. The goal of the board is to receive claims from Yezidi victims regarding killings, abduction, and rape.
The board, however, has no budget or location and Yezidi activists expressed objections to the fact that all the judges assigned to the body are Muslim and the board lacks expertise to examine forensic evidence from mass graves.
“What we want is an international commission to examine the Yezidi genocide and draw up an accurate historical narrative. We want these people to have to stand up and explain why they did what they did, so we can all learn from this. We don’t want everyone simply to be silenced and killed,” Murad Ismael, executive director of Yezidi activist organization Yazda, told HRW.
The current judicial efforts fail to provide a historical record, remedies for victims, or to prioritize the most serious crimes. The broad prosecution now underway will “impede future community reconciliation and reintegration and clog up Iraqi courts and prisons for decades to come,” HRW concluded.
