Swedish woman charged for allowing son to fight alongside ISIS in Syria

The 49-year-old woman, whose identity is not revealed by authorities, is the first person known to have been charged in Sweden with aiding the recruitment of her own minor son as a child soldier.

 

A Swedish woman has been charged with war crimes for helping enlist her 12-year-old son to fight as a child soldier in Syria, where he was killed in the war.

 

The Swedish woman allegedly travelled to Syria in 2013, Sweden’s prosecution authority said on Tuesday, a year before Daesh declared a “caliphate” in large swathes of the country and neighbouring Iraq.

 

The boy, born in 2001, fought for groups which include Daesh at the start of 2013. He died in 2017.

 

“The woman is being charged for having made it possible that he be recruited and used as a child soldier” from August 2013 to May 2016, the authority said in a statement.

 

Authorities released no further identifying details about the mother or her child.

 

The woman denies the charge, her lawyer, Mikael Westerlund, said. 

If found guilty she faces a minimum prison sentence of four years, prosecutor Reena Devgun said.

 

According to the United Nations, recruiting and using children under the age of 15 as soldiers is prohibited under international humanitarian law and recognised as a war crime by the International Criminal Court.

 

Under Swedish law, courts can try people for crimes against international law committed abroad. 

 

The trial will start on Monday, January 10. 

 

Source: Agencies