Kirkuk – Garmiyan Court sentences IS member to life in prison

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The criminal court of Kirkuk – Garmiyan sentenced a male accused of involvement in acts of terrorism committed as a member of the Islamic State (IS) to life in prison, security announced on Wednesday.

According to a statement released by Garmiyan security, the conviction was against Muhanad Sabah Ibrahim, an ethnic Arab resident of the city of Khanaqin in Diyala Province who was born in 1979.

It continued by detailing that security forces arrested Ibrahim in Sulaimani Province on March 2 after spending three months gathering information about him. He was suspected of taking an active part in "terrorist explosions" and of transporting suicide bombers to the middle and southern provinces of Iraq.

The statement mentions that Ibrahim admitted in court to being a member of IS and of carrying out acts of terrorism in the country.

The life sentence was given on Monday, according to the statement, and was based on counter-terrorism laws. He will be transferred to a prison on Sulaimani to serve his sentence.

It is the second sentence to be issued by the court for IS members in a week.

On May 30, the same court sentenced Hamza Kitab Ahmed, an ethnic Arab from the town of Saadiya, to seven years in prison. Ahmed, born in 1988, was arrested in Maidan on July 11, 2017, on charges of terrorism, according to Garmiyan security, and was also transferred to Sulaimani to serve his sentence.

Editing by John J. Catherine