Two more French members of the Islamic State were convicted on terrorism charges and sentenced to die by the Iraqi government Monday, meaning that all eleven French citizens and one French resident who have been put on trial in Iraq in recent days are now facing the death penalty. France, which banned capital punishment in 1981, has protested these dozen death sentences, even as it has claimed that the proceedings in Iraq were fair and has defended its decision not to bring the French ISIS members back to France to face justice there.
This comes as governments around the world struggle over what to do about the thousands of foreign fighters that have been captured in Iraq and Syria following the collapse of ISIS’s so-called caliphate. President Trump tweeted in February, “The United States is asking Britain, France, Germany, and other European allies to take back over 800 ISIS fighters that we captured in Syria and put them on trial.” But despite this request, many Western European countries have been reticent about allowing them to return home to stand trial, with hundreds of foreign-born terrorists now either languishing in prisons run by U.S.-allied groups, like the Syrian Democratic Forces, or else facing harsh justice in Iraq.
French Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs Jean-Yves Le Drian defended the French government against accusations that it was trying to have it both ways last Wednesday. “Those terrorists — because we are indeed talking about terrorists who have attacked us and have also spread death in Iraq — must be tried where they committed their crimes,” Le Drian said. “That’s our position, and it’s also shared by several European countries concerned. So it’s up to the Iraqi courts to try them.”
But immediately after that, Le Drian said that the French government was fighting against the death sentences that had been handed down. “We’re totally opposed to the death penalty, and we say so,” Le Drian explained. “We’ve already taken the necessary steps: I myself have said it to the Iraqi President, Barham Salih, to whom I reiterated our position. We’re against the death penalty everywhere, including in the United States, wherever it exists, and of course including in Iraq.”
The convicted French ISIS members all have the right to appeal their sentences, and the French government has said that “France is opposed, on principle, to the death penalty, anytime and anywhere” and that the French embassy “is taking the necessary steps to remind the Iraqi authorities of this constant position.” The appeals process could take months.
The death sentences for French ISIS members caused a stir within France, and an open letter from 45 French lawyers lamented that “young Frenchmen are threatened with being hanged.” The lawyers lambasted the French government over its unwillingness to bring the French fighters home to France: “Our country will not only do everything to prevent our nationals from returning to France but will do everything they can to be tried on the spot. And whatever the unfairness of the procedures they would be subject to and whatever, we now know, the risk of execution they could incur.”
And left-leaning Human Rights Watch has claimed that at least some of the French prisoners may have been mistreated, tortured, and forced to confess under duress. Lama Fakij, the acting Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, said that “France and other countries should not be outsourcing management of their terrorism suspects to abusive justice systems.”
“These countries should not be sitting idly by while their citizens are transferred to a country where their right to a fair trial and protection from torture are undermined,” Fakih said.
But the French government has pushed back against claims like this, with Le Drian saying, “I would like to tell you, contrary to what I hear here and there: the trial is fair.” Speaking to the French National Assembly last week, Le Drian defended Iraq’s system of justice: “The hearings are public, the trials are conducted by a magistrate headquarters, assisted by two assessors. The indictment is led by a prosecutor. A clerk records live all the proceedings. The lawyer is present and, if there is a translation problem, the embassy itself provides the interpreters. The judge states the charges at the beginning of the hearing, the accused is offered the floor throughout the hearing, the lawyer intervenes when he wishes.”
And Le Drian dismissed any suggestion that the French ISIS members were innocent of their crimes, claiming that most of them “are well known to our services for terrorist action against our country.”
The Guardian described the scene inside the Iraqi courtroom where these French ISIS members were tried for their crimes: “In the presence of journalists, French diplomats, and UN observers, they listened to the accusations levied against them: joining ISIS and taking part in military operations. Videos set to dramatic music charted out their journey to Syria and their role in the terror group.
And the Guardian reported that “Baghdad’s court referred to intelligence reports detailing the Frenchmen’s activities, but didn’t present them during the public hearings.”
One Tunisian-born French citizen, Mustapha Merzoughi, confessed in court and asked for leniency, admitting, “I made a mistake. I joined a terror organization.”
“But I didn’t kill anyone,” Merzoughi claimed.
After considering the evidence, Iraqi court judge Ahmed Al Hurdaithy told him, “The court finds that the evidence obtained against you is sufficient to prove that you joined an armed terror organization. The court sentences you to death by hanging.”
ISIS’s short-lived reign in Syria and Iraq was marked by attempted genocide, extreme violence, crucifixions, beheadings, slavery, the subjugation of women, and the inspiration of like-minded terrorists around the globe. Yet the Islamic State attracted thousands of foreign fighters, including reportedly hundreds from the United States. It is unclear whether the U.S. has a plan for how to deal with all of its own foreign fighters.
Acting Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan announced in March that “the liberation of the territory once held by ISIS in Iraq and Syria is 100 percent complete” and celebrated the fact that “more than 20,000 square miles in Iraq and Syria have been cleared of ISIS since January 2017 and the terror group no longer controls populated areas.”
