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 In a report based on 500 interviews with witnesses, also said
Iraqi government air strikes on the Sunni Muslim militants had
caused "significant civilian deaths" by hitting villages, a school
and hospitals in violation of international law.
At least 9,347 civilians had been killed and 17,386 wounded so far
through September, well over half of them since the Islamist
insurgents also known as ISIL and ISIS began seizing large parts of
northern Iraq in early June, the report said.
"The array of violations and abuses perpetrated by ISIL and
associated armed groups is staggering, and many of their acts may
amount to war crimes or crimes against humanity," said U.N. High
Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad al Hussein.
In a statement, he called again for the Baghdad government to join
the International Criminal Court, saying the Hague court was set up
to prosecute such massive abuses and direct targeting of civilians
on the basis of their religious or ethnic group.
Islamist forces have committed gross human rights violations and
violence of an "increasing sectarian nature" against groups
including Christians, Yazidis and Shi'ite Muslims in a widening
conflict that has forced 1.8 million Iraqis to flee their homes,
according to the 29-page report by the U.N. Human Rights Office and
the U.N. Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI).
"These include attacks directly targeting civilians and civilian
infrastructure, executions and other targeted killings of civilians,
abductions, rape and other forms of sexual and physical violence
perpetrated against women and children, forced recruitment of
children, destruction or desecration of places of religious or
cultural significance, wanton destruction and looting of property,
and denial of fundamental freedoms."
FEMALE "SEX SLAVES"
In a single massacre on June 12, the report said, about 1,500 Iraqi
soldiers and security officers from the former U.S. Camp Speicher
military base in Salahuddin province were captured and killed by
Islamic State fighters.
However, the bodies have not been exhumed and the precise toll is
not known. No one disputes that Iraqi military recruits were led off
the base near Tikrit unarmed and then machinegunned in their
hundreds into mass graves by Islamic State, whose fighters boasted
of the killings on the Internet.
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Women have been treated particularly harshly, the report said: "ISIL
(has) attacked and killed female doctors, lawyers, among other
professionals."
In August, it said, ISIL took 450-500 women and girls to the Tal
Afar citadel in Iraq's Nineveh region where "150 unmarried girls and
women, predominantly from the Yazidi and Christian communities, were
reportedly transported to Syria, either to be given to ISIL fighters
as a reward or to be sold as sex slaves".
Islamic State pushed on with its assault on a Syrian border town on
Thursday despite coalition air strikes meant to weaken them, sending
thousands more Kurdish refugees into Turkey and dragging Ankara
deeper into the conflict.
Islamic State and allied groups have attacked and destroyed places
of religious and cultural significance in Iraq that do not conform
to its "takfiri" doctrine, the U.N. report said, referring to the
beliefs of Sunni militants who justify their violence by branding
others as apostates.
But the report also voiced deep concern at violations committed by
the Baghdad government and allied fighters, including air strikes
and shelling that may not have distinguished between military
targets and civilian areas.
(additional reporting by Ned Parker in Baghdad; Editing by Louise
Ireland)
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