'Staggering' abuses by 'IS'

The report released on Thursday accuses "Islamic State" (IS) fighters and other armed groups of a wide range of abuses.

"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," the UN's high commissioner for human rights, Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, said in a statement posted on his office's website.

Among the abuses cited in the report are "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."

According to the report, investigators also found credible evidence of the "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."

In response to the report, Zeid said he had called on the new government in Baghdad to sign on to the International Criminal Court immediately in order to give it jurisdiction to investigate alleged crimes."

"This type of situation, where massive gross violations and abuses are taking place, including direct targeting of many thousands of civilians because of their religious or ethnic identity, is precisely why the International Criminal Court was created," Zeid said.

Possible abuses by Iraqi forces

The report, compiled by the UN's Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI), also found that the state security forces and allied fighters may have violated international humanitarian and human rights law. It cited potentially disproportionate or indiscriminate airstrikes and shelling of IS targets.

The 29-page report, which covers the period between July 6 and September 10, was released a day after UNAMI announced that at least 9,347 civilians had been killed and more than 17,000 others wounded in Iraq in 2014.

Iraqi forces backed by airstrikes from the US and a small number of its allies have been fighting to take back large swaths of territory in the north of the country that IS fighters have overrun over the past few months.

The US and a small number of Arab allies have also bombed IS targets in neighboring Syria.

Thpugh the country has ruled out a combat role, Germany is providing arms and training to Kurdish fighters battling IS in northern Iraq.

pfd/mkg (AFP, Reuters)