Germany fights to have runaway ISIS teen spared death penalty in Iraq
A German teenager who fled her home to join ISIS after being groomed online will likely stand trial in Iraq.
Linda Wenzel, 16, and three other German women were charged this week after they were captured in July in Mosul, German weekly Der Spiegel reports.
If convicted, Wenzel could face the death penalty.
However, the teenager would not be put to death before the age of 22 if she were found guilty and sentenced, The Independent reports.
Wenzel fled from Pulsnitz near Dresden in Germany on July 1 last year after she reportedly converted to Islam following grooming on social media by an Islamic State recruiter.
Video of her arrest shows the teen being dragged away by two Iraqi men.
She appears to be in pain in the video.
German media had previously interviewed Wenzel, who admitted her regret joining the terrorist organisation at age 15 after she married a Chechen terrorist.
“I just want to get away from here,” she said.
“I want to get away from the war, from the many weapons, from the noise. I just want to go home to my family.”
She was arrested by Iraqi forces after she and a group of 20 female ISIS supporters from Russia, Turkey, Canada and Chechnya barricaded themselves inside a tunnel with guns and explosives, The Guardian reports.
It's understood German authorities had been hoping to have the girls extradited back to Germany as the country opposes the death penalty.
Iraqi authorities have now opened criminal proceedings against Wenzel, who is currently in jail in Baghdad.
She gained entry into Syria after she forged a letter from her mother in order to buy a plane ticket to Istanbul where she then crossed into the war-torn country.
Wenzel married a Chechen fighter who was killed in combat, and when she was captured in Mosul she was carrying a malnourished baby believed to be the couple's child.
