Two men charged with IS war crimes in Germany “The idea was that no one dies”: ex-Putin adviser questions war in Ukraine

The German Federal Prosecutor’s Office has charged two men before the Oberlandesgericht Düsseldorf with membership of foreign terrorist organizations, war crimes and murder in Syria.

They are said to have kidnapped and murdered people in the name of the terrorist organization ‘Islamic State’ (IS). The Syrians have been stuck since March. The Senate for State Security must decide whether a trial will be scheduled.

In concrete terms, Germany’s highest prosecutor accuses the men of membership of one or more terrorist organizations abroad and war crimes in the form of taking hostages resulting in death. One is also said to have been guilty of killing people protected under international humanitarian law and of murder. The background is the civil war in Syria, in which state forces and opposition groups are fighting each other. it was said.

One of the suspects is said to have founded an armed combat unit with up to 50 fighters in Damascus in the autumn of 2012 and to have joined the terrorist group “Ahfad al-Rasul Brigades”, which wanted to overthrow the Syrian leadership by force of arms. To do this, the group carried out explosive attacks on state facilities.

The suspect is said to be responsible for such an attack. By the end of 2013, he defected to IS and, as so-called emir, commanded approximately 200 IS fighters who kidnapped opponents of the organization and executed them together with other prisoners from IS prisons.

The second suspect also joined IS as a fighter in 2013, the federal prosecutor’s office said. He participated in the arrest of a victim, supervised the twelve prisoners at the execution site and shot at least one person. (saw/sda/dpa)