03:02 16.12.2014(updated 03:39 16.12.2014)
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UNITED NATIONS, December 16 (Sputnik) – Hundreds of children, some as young as five years old, are being trained for combat in a military camp in Ar-Raqqah, Syria, by Islamic State (IS) militants, UN humanitarian chief Valerie Amos has told the Security Council.
According to Amos, some 350 children undergo training at the IS camp in Ar-Raqqah and "reports of children killed or public executed, crucified, beheaded and stoned to death, particularly by ISIL [IS], have increased in recent months".
"Recently, Kurdish refugees from Kobani [in northern Syria] reported the capture of young girls by ISIL for sexual purposes," Amos added, speaking to the UN Security Council Monday.
According to the UN humanitarian chief, girls in Syria are forced to marry IS militants or are sold into sexual slavery.
"Parents are terrified of their unmarried daughters being forced to marry ISIL fighters in areas under their control. Women captured as slaves by ISIL have been sold in markets in Ar-Raqqa. Some are sold to individual men, others are kept in ISIL rest houses and rape multiple rapes by fighters returning from the battlefield," Amos told the UN Security Council.
IS, also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) or the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), has been fighting the Syrian government since 2012, having also ceased vast areas in Iraq.
The radical Sunni group is known for its extreme violence against civilians, as well as journalist abductions and executions.
A UN commission has accused IS of war crimes and crimes against humanity for such brutal tactics as killing, enslavement, rape and sexual slavery.