Islamic State fingered after mass grave found in Mosul

IRAQI officials in Iraq’s northwestern Nineveh governorate have accused Islamic State (IS) of executing more than 500 Iraqis and dumping their bodies in a mass grave near Mosul.

Iraq’s pro-government Popular Mobilisation Units said they had found a mass grave about 15km west of Mosul.

“Over 500 bodies have been dumped by IS terrorists into this huge mass grave. Most of the victims were prisoners in the IS-run Badoush detention centre,” the units’ leadership said.

Locals reported that thousands of others had been massacred by the militants and buried in and around Mosul over the past three years since the group took over the city in 2014.

“With the advance of the US-backed forces into Mosul, we expect more of such mass graves to be discovered,” said Iraqi journalist Redi Osso. Human Rights Watch reported earlier that IS had executed 600 prisoners in the Badoush prison since the group took over Mosul.

However, Human Rights Watch also recently reported that members of the Popular Mobilisation Units were abusing men, whom they assumed to be active in the IS or sympathetic to the group, who had fled Mosul, as fighting intensified.

Iraqi military groups were screening and detaining men fleeing Mosul in unidentified detention centres where they were cut off from contact with the outside world, Human Rights Watch said. “Many relatives are telling us that their male family members are being stopped by Popular Mobilisation Units fighters and disappearing,” said Lama Fakih, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch.