(ABC-Australia) A New Zealander serving with the Islamic State group has been captured in northern Syria and is being held in a Kurdish prison.
Nicknamed the Kiwi Jihadi, Mark Taylor told the ABC he fled the Islamic State group in December and surrendered to Kurdish forces because life had become unbearable.
“There was no food, no money, basic services were pretty much collapsed. I was in a pickle myself and had to make a final decision, which was to leave,” Taylor said.
“That was a hard decision to call, because people were telling me ‘you can’t leave, you came here for the sake of Allah, you came here to die’.”
For five years he lived with the extremist group but claims he wasn’t a fighter and was only deployed as a guard.
