Emilie König, a Frenchwoman suspected of recruiting fighters for Islamic State who appeared on US and UN blacklists, has been arrested by Kurdish forces in Syria, her mother said on Tuesday.

The 33-year-old daughter of a gendarme is “being held in a Kurdish camp and has been interrogated and tortured,” her mother told Ouest-France newspaper.

König went to Syria in 2014 and three of her children were born there.

She converted to Islam after marrying her first husband, an Algerian man, who was arrested for drug trafficking.

König learned Arabic, changed her name to Samra and started wearing a veil. She left for Syria to join her new partner, who was later killed. She appeared in several propaganda videos in which she appealed for jihad “as long as the enemy is around”.

Her mother said she wanted to return to France and to seek “forgiveness of her family, her friends and her country”.