The jihadist group has until now filled its $2million-a-year war chest from a variety of shadowy sources including oil production, human trafficking and drug smuggling.

But it was revealed today that it has been recruiting foreign doctors for months to harvest the internal organs not only from the bodies of their own dead fighters but also from living hostages - including children - snatched from minority communities in Iraq and Syria.

The shocking news was revealed in a report by al-Monitor news website, citing an Iraqi ear, nose and throat doctor named Siruwan al-Mosuli.

He told the site that IS commanders have hired foreign doctors to run an extensive organ trafficking system from a hospital in the captured city of Mosul, northern Iraq, that is already beginning to generate huge profits.

It claims the terror organisation has even set up a specialist organ-smuggling division whose sole responsibility is to sell human hearts, livers and kidneys on the lucrative international black market. 

'[Al-Mosuli] said that lately he noticed unusual movement within medical facilities in Mosul Arab and foreign surgeons were hired, but prohibited from mixing with local doctors,' the report's author wrote. 'Information then leaked about organ selling.' 

(dailymail.co.uk)