The woman who was burned alive for refusing to engage in an 'extreme sex act.'

Women and girls are kept as slaves and tortured at will by their captors.

Enslaved.

Traded like cattle.

Raped.

Burned alive.

These are only a few examples of the violence and terror suffered by female captives of the Islamic State.

The United Nations special representative on sexual violence in conflict recently toured Yazidi refugee camps in Syria, where she documented the tales of torture witnessed by women who escaped.

In an interview with a Middle Eastern news source this week, Zainab Bangura explained how IS is “institutionalising sexual violence.”

“The brutalisation of women and girls is central to their ideology,” she told Middle East Eye.

Related content: ISIS’ abhorrent punishment for women who breastfeed in public.

Upon capture, Ms Bangura reports the women and men are separated (men and boys over 14 are killed), and then girls are “stripped naked, tested for virginity and examined for breast size and prettiness.”

“The youngest, and those considered the prettiest virgins fetch higher prices and are sent to Raqqa, the IS stronghold,” she said, explaining the market for female slaves.

“There is a hierarchy: sheikhs get first choice, then emirs, then fighters. They often take three or four girls each and keep them for a month or so, until they grow tired of a girl, when she goes back to market. At slave auctions, buyers haggle fiercely, driving down prices by disparaging girls as flat-chested or unattractive.

“We heard about one girl who was traded 22 times, and another, who had escaped, told us that the sheikh who had captured her wrote his name on the back of her hand to show that she was his ‘property’.”

Ms Bangura has worked in several war-torn nations including Bosnia, Congo, South Sudan, Somalia and Central African Republic, but says she has never witnessed cruelty and violence to this extent.

Related content: The details the Islamic State’s official guidelines for rape.

Perhaps one of the most severe cases she recounted was that of a girl who was burned alive after refusing to perform an “extreme sex act.”

Ms Bangura claims jihadis expect to “get” women to keep as domestic slaves, and to satisfy them sexually.

Many of the men are married, but can keep several slaves as well as their wives.

Ms Bangura states hundreds of girls have managed to escape. She told Middle East Eye that some have even escaped with the assistance of jihadist’s wives. Some are rescued by their families after being held to ransom.

The Independent estimates there are between 3,000 and 5,000 women and girls held captive by IS, and most of them are Yazidi.

Yazidis are a non-Islamic ethnic and religious minority, located mostly in northern Iraq.

Bangura is urging the UN and other organisations to provide aid and support to help escaped victims rebuild their lives and overcome their trauma.

Read more:

Four terrified women have told of being enslaved by Australian jihadists.

Girls are being raped and buried alive by the Islamic State. Why aren’t we talking about it?

The creepy blogs luring Australians into joining Isis.

Why young Australian men are becoming radicalised – and how to spot it.

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