Girl, 15, ‘kept as sex slave after being bought for £7,000’

A 31-year-old ISIS bride faces decades behind jail after being accused of keeping a teenage sex slave her dad had bought for £7,000. Australian Zeinab Ahmad is thought to have acted as a “deputy” of the household where the teenager was repeatedly abused by her father.

She will face trial for two counts of crimes against humanity for slavery, each of which carries a maximum sentence of 25 years. Ahmad badly “mistreated” the girl while the ISIS bride’s father, Mohammed Ahmad, forced her into sexual servitude, it is claimed.

According to Chief Magistrate Lisa Hannan, she still poses a risk to the community, so she was denied bail on Wednesday, The Sun reports. Hannan added that “exceptional circumstances” would be needed to grant those conditions, given Ahmad’s past support of violent ISIS extremists.

Ahmad’s defence team said that she has renounced her association with the group.

Her lawyer, Grace Morgan, told the court: “My client does not support Islamic State. She rejects the organisation. She has a deep anger towards it.”

However, Hannan dismissed the argument, claiming that she found “no compelling evidence” that this was the case.

She said: “They are, in my view, insufficient to counter the evidence of her words and actions in Syria.

“They are made after her arrest, after separation from her daughter and in the context of an application for bail.

“They are in my view insufficient to counter the evidence of her words and actions in Syria which exhibit clear risk to the community if they are still adhered to.”

Hannan added: “In my view, the risk of terrorism lies within, in belief systems, thoughts and adherence to the views of others who distort religious teachings to promote hate. It is demonstrated by prior conduct.

“After that period of time, there is no clear evidence of renunciation in the years she was in the IDP camps.”

Ahmad is part of a group of ISIS brides arrested in May when they returned from Syria to Australia. She allegedly travelled to Syria from Sydney in 2015 alongside her mother, Kawsar Ahmad, and father, Mohammed Ahmad, when her husband joined the Islamic State.

She is accused of helping her family to enslave a Yazidi girl, part of the Kurdish ethnic minority living in Syria.

The father, Mohammed, allegedly told the girl: “I bought you for the purpose of raping and at the same time serving the home.”

To his family, he reportedly said: “I bought her for sex and to do housework.”

Zeinab saw her father hitting the girl and dragging her by the hair down two flights of stairs, police alleged.

The anonymous victim told the police that the father repeatedly sexually assaulted her.

She said Zeinab “did not physically hurt her, although she did threaten her very badly and ordered her to do things around the house”, recounted Detective Clendenning.

She was also allegedly beaten two or three times a month while the family watched on, police added.

Sixteen months after Mohammed had bought the Yazidi girl, he sold her again for £7,500, telling her she was “bad” and did not follow orders, according to police.

The trafficked girl said she was one of more than 6,800 Yazidi women and children who have been enslaved and repeatedly raped by members of ISIS.

The trial will continue at a date yet to be fixed.