BEIRUT: Islamic State insurgents have opened an office in northern Syria where single women and widows can register to marry fighters from the Al-Qaeda offshoot, a monitoring group said on Monday.

The office in Al-Bab, a town northeast of Aleppo city, records the names and addresses of the women so that Islamic State militants can go to their families and make a formal offer of marriage, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The Observatory, which cited sources in Al-Bab and Aleppo, is based in Britain and relies on a network of people on the ground in Syria to report information. It was not immediately possible to confirm the report independently.

There have been previous reports of militants seeking wives or forcing women to marry them in areas where the group has been active. The Observatory’s director, Rami Abdurrahman, said it was the first time he had heard of the group setting up a formal office to register potential spouses.

Meanwhile, France said on Monday it was ready to welcome Christians from northern Iraq who have been told by IS to either covert to Islam, pay a religious levy or face death.

“We are providing aid to displaced people fleeing from the threats of Islamic Sate and who have sought refuge in Kurdistan. We are ready, if they wish, to facilitate their asylum on our soil,” France’s foreign and interior ministers said. “We are in constant contact with local and national authorities to ensure everything is done to protect them.”