Iraq security forces confiscate houses of IS suspects' relatives: HRW

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Iraqi security officers have confiscated, destroyed, or have denied relatives of suspected Islamic State (IS) members access to homes in and around Mosul, said an international human rights organization on Thursday.

"People who commit crimes should be fairly tried and punished, but not entire families," read a report published by Human Rights Watch (HRW). “The prime minister needs to show that his office takes a clear stand against this form of collective punishment."

In many of the multiple instances documented by HRW, members of security forces have taken up residence in homes confiscated. Relatives of IS suspects whose houses have not been taken outright are routinely denied identity documents or barred from returning home.

In one example described in the report, when a 54-year-old woman whose son is accused of IS membership tried to go to court regarding her home, she was met by an intelligence officer who told her, “You are an ISIS family, you have no more rights. The judge said that if you don’t leave now, we should break your legs.”

Federal police came to the home of another woman, 65, where she was living with her daughter and granddaughter, claiming that neighbors had complained about their presence, as an “ISIS family.”

“I said to them, it was only one of my sons, but my daughter, granddaughter, all the rest of us are clean,” she said. “They got angry when I said that and stormed in, and started destroying our water pipes, water tank, dishes, furniture, everything. I left early the next morning, and since then our relatives have told us we can’t come home.”

HRW's deputy Middle East director Lama Fakih said, “These families deserve the same protections that Iraqi courts provide to all citizens... Courts should be the guarantors against discrimination that will only further sectarian divisions in the country and delay needed reconciliation.”

On Tuesday, HRW criticized the Iraqi government's handing down of multiple death penalties to those convicted of IS membership, despite a deeply flawed judicial system without proper safeguards against convicting innocent people.