German police on Tuesday (February 7th) arrested a Syrian man on suspicion of belonging to the "Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant" (ISIL) and of raping a woman as she attempted to flee an ISIL-held area in Syria with her children, AFP reported.
The 31-year-old suspect was detained in the north-eastern state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomeria, the federal prosecutor's office said in a statement.
Prosecutors allege that he manned a checkpoint in Syria that sought to prevent citizens from escaping ISIL-controlled territory.
In early 2016, he stopped a woman who was trying to flee with her children, they said.
"Under the pretext of obtaining the necessary 'exit permit', the accused lured her to a house and raped her," prosecutors said in the statement.
The rape could amount to a war crime, they added.
German federal prosecutors have launched around a dozen investigations concerning alleged war crimes committed in Syria or Iraq, alongside dozens of cases of suspected membership of extremist groups.
