Iraq denies agreement with Russia over extraditing female Islamic State members
Female Islamic State members (representational photo).
A statement by the Foreign Ministry quoted the Iraqi ambassador to Moscow, Haidar al-Athari, as saying “Regarding possibility of transferring Russian females, who were sentenced to life by the Iraqi judiciary in April over joining terrorist groups, to Russia to spend their sentence there, there is no agreements between the two countries to exchange prisoners or transfer them.”
In case such agreement was signed, according to Athari, “it could be possible to do this, if the terms of the agreement allowed this, after Russian authorities request this. But at the meantime, a recognition of judgment request could be filed, then the court would consider it. If the suspects were condemned of terrorism or accessing the country illegally, they would be penalized, as per the Iraqi laws. If they were proven innocent, they would stand retrial.”
Athari stressed that “the embassies of the two country are closely following up on the issue,” adding that the Russian embassy in Baghdad and one of the Russian media channels filed a request to the Iraqi government to visit the Russian inmates and it was approved. He described this as an evidence for cooperation between the Russian and Iraqi government within legal contexts.
Hundreds of foreign wives and children of Islamic State militants were arrested by iraqi forces as territories held by the extremist group since 2014 were gradually seized back.
The exact number of detained militants is still unknown, however, it’s estimated to be at thousands.