Sir, – Saturday (August 3rd) marks the fifth anniversary of the attempt by Isis to annihilate the Yazidi community in Iraq. Over a few short days thousands of men were brutally slaughtered, over 7,000 Yazidi women and girls as young as nine years were abducted into sexual slavery, hundreds of thousands had to flee for their lives, and thousands became trapped while seeking shelter in searing August heat on Mount Sinjar.
The outrage was a defining moment in galvanising the world’s response to Isis. The Yazidi community, most publicly represented by 2018 Nobel Peace Prize winner Nadia Murad, were subjected to “the crime of genocide”, according to a 2017 United Nations Commission of Inquiry.
While Isis has been militarily defeated, hundreds of thousands of Yazidis have had no option but to remain in camps across Kurdistan for the last five years, unable to return home. This is due to the ongoing insecurity and systematic mining of their home areas together with the complete destruction by Isis of all infrastructure.
It is appropriate on the fifth anniversary that the world recalls and fully acknowledges this atrocity. Continued action must be taken by the United Nations and the international community to assist women and children who suffered unspeakable abuses, to enable Yazidi families to return to and reconstruct their towns, villages and farms, and to bring the perpetrators of these atrocities to justice. – Yours, etc,
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Senator IVANA BACIK
(Labour),
NIALL COLLINS TD
(Fianna Fáil),
SEAN CROWE TD
Sinn Féin,
FRANCES
FITZGERALD MEP
(Fine Gael),
CATHERINE
MURPHY TD
(Social Democrats),
MAUREEN
O’SULLIVAN TD
(Independent),
EAMON RYAN TD
(Green Party),
Leinster House,
Dublin 2.