Ravina Shamdasani, a spokesperson for the UN human rights office, has told a news briefing that many women had similarly been executed in Daesh-controlled areas.
“Educated, professional women, particularly women who have run as candidates in elections for public office, seem to be particularly at risk,” Shamdasani said.
“In just the first two weeks of this year, reports indicate that three female lawyers were executed,” she added.
The terrorists also target homosexuals, with two men reportedly executed in Mosul in northern Iraq, some 400 km north of Baghdad.
Anyone accused of violating the fundamentalists’ extremist interpretations of Islamic Sharia law, or suspected of disloyalty to its canons is subjected to “cruel and inhuman punishments” Ravina Shamdasani said.
Four doctors have recently been killed in Mosul, Iraq, allegedly for refusing to treat Islamist fighters, 15 civilians were executed in Fallujah for helping the Iraqi security forces, and 14 north of Tikrit for refusing to pledge allegiance to the group, Shamdasani added.
Originally founded by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as the Group for Monotheism and Jihad, Daesh became known as al-Qaeda in Iraq in 2004 and later the Islamic State after the U.S. troop withdrawal.