Runaway German teen recruited by ISIS arrested in Iraq

A 16-year-old German girl, who went
missing a year ago after converting to
Islam, has been identified among those
captured by the Iraqi military last week, a
prosecutor confirmed. According to Iraqi
officials, the girl was working with ISIS
police.
Named only as ‘Linda W.’ in accordance
with German privacy laws, the teen from
the town of Pulsnitz has been confirmed to
be the one detained in Iraq recently,
Dresden prosecutor Lorenz Haase said.
“We do not know where she was staying
last year, whom she contacted, what she
did. We must determine this in the near
future in order to find out whether she
committed a criminal offense or
not,” Haase told n-tv news.
“Our information ends with the girl’s
arrival in Istanbul about a year ago,” Hasse
said, as cited by AP. He added that he
could not verify whether Linda W. worked
with Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL).
Three Iraqi intelligence and investigative
officials, who spoke to AP on condition of
anonymity, say Linda W. had worked with
an Islamic State police department, as did
three other women from Germany detained
together with her.
The three other women are allegedly of
Moroccan, Algerian, and Chechen origin.
Their husbands were IS fighters, the
officials said. Initial reports suggested
there were five women from Germany who
had been detained in Mosul days after it
was reclaimed from IS.
The girl is currently receiving consular
assistance from the German Embassy in
Bagdad, the prosecutor said. She is being
held in a prison near the Iraqi capital’s
airport, according to Iraqi officials.
Since a German arrest warrant has not
been issued, it remains unclear whether
the teen will return home, Haase said,
adding that “there is the possibility that
Linda might be put on trial in
Iraq.” However, she might be extradited
back to Germany, either because she is a
foreigner or because she is a minor
reported missing abroad.
However, if convicted on terrorist charges,
she can face capital punishment in
Iraq, according to Der Spiegel.
Before fleeing to Iraq, Linda W. is said to
have connected with IS members in online
chatrooms. Iraqi officials claim Linda W.
met an Arab Muslim on the internet and
married him.
Der Spiegel reports that Linda suddenly
grew interested in Islam, making a second
Facebook account with an Arabic name
and fasting during the holy month of
Ramadan. The girl reportedly did not make
a secret out of her conversion to Islam,
eventually asking her school’s headmaster
if she could wear a headscarf.
“It was very surprising, though, that the
girl has been radicalized in such a
way,” Pulsnitz Mayor Barbara Lueke said.
According to Germany’s domestic
intelligence service (BfV), 930 people have
left the country over the past few years to
fight in Syria or Iraq on behalf of IS, with
20 percent of them women.