German authorities are investigating whether a suspected Islamic State fighter seized by Iraqi forces in the war-torn city of Mosul is a 16-year-old German schoolgirl who disappeared from her parents’ home in Saxony a year ago after apparently being groomed by jihadist groups online. An Iraqi commander in Mosul confirmed to the Guardian that all the arrested women had since been transferred to Baghdad. “Communications with Iraq are proving difficult, but we are doing everything necessary to establish whether the girl arrested is Linda W,” a spokesperson, Lorenz Haase, told the Guardian. In spring 2016 Linda told her parents of her growing interest in Islam, but hid the fact that she had converted to the religion. “We didn’t think anything of it, and even bought her a copy of the Qur’an,” her mother, Katharina, told German media.

Source: The Guardian July 19, 2017 15:45 UTC