Molly Quell

Dutch woman sentenced to 10 years for keeping Yazidi slave The United Nations has called the Islamic State group's treatment of the ethnic minorities a genocide.

December 11, 2024 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) A Dutch court has sentenced a woman to 10 years in prison for crimes against humanity for keeping a Yazidi woman as a slave in Syria, in the first case against the minority group in the Netherlands. Hasna Aarab was […]

Suspected spy tells Dutch judges it is too ‘unsafe’ to discuss case Dutch authorities arrested a former employee of the country’s counterterrorism service, accusing him of selling state secrets to Morocco.

November 4, 2024 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) A man charged with giving classified information to Morocco told judges at the Rotterdam District Court he did not want to discuss the case against him because it was “unsafe” to do so. Abderrahim El M. — names of defendants […]

Victims describe life in IS captivity in first Dutch Yazidi trial In 2021, a court in Germany handed down the first conviction for the mistreatment of the Yazidi religious minority by the Islamic State group.

October 16, 2024 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) Two women kept as slaves by members of the Islamic State militant group described their experiences in captivity, including losing children, in a Dutch court on Wednesday. The women, referred to by the court as Z. and S. for privacy […]

Dutch government led by hard right asks for formal opt-out from EU migration rules

September 18, 2024 Molly Quell and Raf Casert

(AP) The new Dutch government dominated by the far-right party of Geert Wilders officially asked the European Union for an exemption from its migration obligations on Wednesday, setting up a confrontation over one of the most explosive issues facing the bloc at […]

Top European rights court upholds ban on ritual animal slaughter After losing their case at the EU’s top court in Luxembourg, a coalition of Muslims and Jews turned to the European Court of Human Rights.

February 13, 2024 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) Europe’s top rights court upheld a ban on killing livestock without first stunning them, finding on Tuesday that animal welfare could trump religious practice. A mixed-faith group of people and organizations brought the complaint to the European Court of Human […]

Court convicts first pro-Assad war crimes defendant in Netherlands While the Dutch have brought several Syrians to trial for crimes committed during their country’s civil war, previous defendants were all members of opposition forces.

January 22, 2024 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) Dutch judges sentenced a former militia commander to 12 years in prison for complicity in torture and illegal detention on Monday, marking the first conviction of a pro-government Syrian defendant in the Netherlands. The 35-year-old, identified only as Mustafa A., […]

Trial begins for first pro-government Syrian war crimes suspect in Netherlands The 35-year-old man was arrested in 2022 after he applied for asylum in the Netherlands.

November 30, 2023 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) Judges at The Hague District Court spent Thursday looking at photos taken from Facebook of a man posing with corpses and weapons who prosecutors say committed war crimes and crimes against humanity in Syria. The man, identified as Mustafa A., […]

European rights court hears yearlong house arrest case A French man suspected of supporting radial Islam is challenging an onerous police house arrest order imposed on him following the 2015 Paris terror attacks.

October 18, 2022 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) Europe’s top rights court heard arguments on Tuesday over whether a 13-month house arrest order imposed on a French man for alleged extremist views violated his human rights. Lawyers for David Pagerie argued before the European Court of Human Rights […]

EU high court upholds workplace headscarf ban The ruling marks the second time in as many years that the European Union’s top court has sided against women who want to wear an Islamic head covering at work.

October 13, 2022 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) Bans on head coverings are allowed in European Union workplaces as long as they apply to all employees, the bloc’s top court ruled Thursday. The European Court of Justice sided with Belgian housing organization SCRL, which refused to move forward […]

Rights court tells France to reconsider repatriation of Islamic State wives Europe’s top rights court found that Paris’ decision about which of its nationals it accepted back from camps in northern Syria was arbitrary and should be reviewed by an independent body.

September 14, 2022 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) The European Court of Human Rights on Wednesday found France was in the wrong for refusing to repatriate two French women who joined the Islamic State terrorist group, ruling the process is too arbitrary. Paris violated a clause in the […]

Somali refugee wins second case against Norway over forced adoption Mariya Abdi Ibrahim won another case at Europe’s human rights court in 2019 over the forced adoption of her son, which resulted in Norway changing some of its regulations around adoption.

December 10, 2021 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) Norway violated the human rights of a Muslim refugee from Somalia when authorities removed her child from her care and placed him with a Christian family, Europe’s top rights court held Friday. The European Court of Human Rights found that […]

Top EU court returns Hamas to terror list after 3-year break The group with majority control of the Palestinian National Authority has been fighting the European Union over its designation as a terrorist group for over a decade.

November 23, 2021 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) A lower EU court was wrong to strike Hamas from the European Union’s list of terrorist organizations, the union’s highest court found on Tuesday. Founded in 1987, following the First Intifada, Hamas is the de facto governing authority of the […]

Austria must give gay refugee another shot at asylum, EU court rules Austria is known for taking a hardline approach to refugees, most recently refusing to take in Afghan refugees after that country fell to the Taliban.

September 9, 2021 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) Austria was wrong to not give an Iraqi refugee a second chance at asylum after he revealed he was gay, the European Union’s highest court held Thursday. The European Court of Justice found that an Iraqi man who applied for […]

Syrian refugee convicted of war crimes in Dutch court Ahmad al Khedr had settled with his family in the small Dutch town of Kapelle before his crimes in Syria were discovered.

July 16, 2021 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) A Dutch court on Friday found a Syrian asylum-seeker guilty of committing war crimes in Syria and sentenced him to 20 years in prison. The District Court of The Hague found that Ahmad al Khedr had participated in the execution […]

Employers can ban Muslim veils at work, top EU court rules Right-wing politicians across the European Union are cheering the Thursday morning decision against religious insignia.

July 15, 2021 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) The EU’s top court ruled on Thursday that companies can ban their employees from wearing headscarves and other religious symbols while on the clock. “An internal rule of an undertaking, prohibiting workers from wearing any visible sign of political, philosophical […]

EU companies can ban workers from wearing headscarves, magistrate says The court adviser found that small-scale religious displays can be allowed at work, but it’s up to national courts to determine what falls in that category.

February 25, 2021 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) In a consolidated case involving a drug store clerk and a day care center employee, a magistrate for the European Union’s high court held that employers can ban Islamic headscarves on neutrality grounds. In a nonbinding legal opinion for the […]

Forced adoption case against Norway hits European rights court A Muslim woman whose son was adopted against her wishes claims Norway violated her right to religious freedom by putting him in the care of a Christian family.

January 27, 2021 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) The European Court of Human Rights heard arguments Wednesday over whether Norway violated the religious rights of a Muslim woman whose child was forcibly adopted by Christians. During a remote hearing before the ECHR, lawyers for Mariya Ibrahim argued the […]

Ban on religious animal slaughter fought at EU high court Belgium has joined Sweden, Norway, Iceland, Denmark and Slovenia in not allowing for any religious exemptions to EU slaughter regulations.

July 8, 2020 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) Religious groups argued their case against a Belgian law banning ritual animal slaughter before the European Union’s highest court on Wednesday, while Belgium denied the law infringes on religious freedom. The law, which requires that animals be stunned before being […]

Rights of asylum seekers trampled in Hungary, EU judge observes

June 25, 2020 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) An EU magistrate condemned Hungary’s refugee policies Thursday, detailing a system where immigrants are made to sleep in shipping containers on the border for months while seeking asylum. Under the EU’s Reception Conditions Directive, people claiming asylum must have access […]

Rights court orders Greece to pay widow in Sharia law case The European Court of Human Rights ruled that Greece must pay a Muslim widow damages for applying Islamic religious law to a dispute over inheritance from her late husband.

June 18, 2020 Molly Quell

(Courthouse News) Chatitze Molla Sali already knew that she’d won the right to inherit her Muslim husband’s full estate two years ago but she had to wait until Thursday to find out just how much the Greek government would have to pay […]