Rights commission: ISIS executed 25 civilians in 2 days

(IraqiNews.com) Baghdad – Islamic State militants have executed 25 civilians over accusations of spying for Iraqi security services, the Iraqi High Commission for Human Rights said Wednesday.

The victims were brought from different regions of Nineveh, according to the commission’s media director, Jawad al-Shamari.

“The group maintains the dead bodies of those executed at the forensic medicine facility, and refuses to hand them over to their relatives, arguing that they were infidels and should not be buried,” Shamari said, quoting sources inside the city.

“Those sources have also confirmed that ISIS had captured 2000 citizens and drove them to Tal Afar to use them as human shields, also accusing them of treason and several other accusations,” he added.

“The group arrests citizens who are found to possess cellphones, computers and other communication tools and executes them,” said al-Shamari.

Iraqi government forces and its allied paramilitaries have entered a month of operations to retake Mosul, ISIS’s last bastion in the country.

On Tuesday, Brig.Gen. Nibras al-Makkoki, a spokesperson for the defense ministry’s Joint Forces Command, said ISIS had been amassing families from several neighborhoods in western Mosul inside schools, vowing to kill violators. “The group is trying to use civilians as human shields…and booby-trapped several houses and civilian vehicles.”

As for the humanitarian situation, Makkoki said, quoting his sources in Mosul, that electricity had been cut from most of the city for two days, with water and medical supplies short of demand.