According to Deutsche Welle, a representative of Germany’s federal police says they have the documents and that they’re authentic.
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A man calling himself Abu Hamed, a former member of Islamic State who became disillusioned with its leaders, passed the files to Britain’s Sky News on a memory stick he said he had stolen from the head of the group’s internal security force.
Analysts on Thursday (March 10) cast doubt on the authenticity of thousands of documents reportedly leaked from the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group, pointing out mistakes and uncharacteristic language. Flow of volunteers to the group from North America and Europe could also be stemmed because a comprehension of the reasons why people travel towards the extremist organization is the key to stop them from doing it. The cache, exposing its members and their families, could undermine its future ability to recruit and inspire would-be members.
The defector, a former Free Syrian Army fighter who switched to Islamic State, said the group had been taken over by former soldiers from the Iraqi Baath party of Saddam Hussein, who was ousted in 2003 after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.
Warren called on media outlets who might have the names and numbers to publish them.
Sueddeutsche Zeitung and the German broadcasters reported they also had obtained the files on the Turkey-Syria border, where they said Islamic State files and videos were widely available from anti-IS Kurdish fighters and members of IS itself.
Copies of the documents broadcast by Sky News showed that recruits would have to answer 23 questions including on their blood type, mother’s maiden name, “level of syariah understanding” and previous experience.
The documents are forms that IS recruits had to fill out in order to be accepted into the organisation, and contain information on nationals from 51 countries, the broadcaster reported.
The news channel reported that a former member of the extremist group had provided these documents on a USB flash drive.
“There’s nothing further I can say about the documents apart from the fact that we have very close cooperation with our partners, and if there’s information that we can share together and what we can learn from each other, then we’ll clearly do that”.
The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant was the official name of the group before al-Baghdadi declared the Islamic State caliphate in June 2014 after the group captured wide areas of Iraq including the northern city of Mosul, the country’s second largest.
The date of the documents suggested they may not provide information on the group’s current membership, but could offer insight into fighters recruited in 2013 as well as its bureaucratic systems.
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Speaking to reporters in Brussels, German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said the documents in Germany’s possession “are most likely authentic” and “show the thoroughness of this criminal organization”. A Central Intelligence Agency assessment in late 2014 put the number of IS fighters at around 31,500.
