“Committees cannot be formed easily. You do not want the committee to be a normal committee formed by the ordinance of the parliamentary presidency and lacking legal power,” Shwan Dawudi, a PUK member of the Iraqi parliament, told Rudaw.
They want the findings of the committee to be brought back into the parliament to be voted on.
“We do not want a committee that does not get listened to,” he added.
On January 8, the Iraqi government voted to establish a multi-ethnic investigative committee to investigate the events that followed the Iraqi army and Iran-backed Hashd al-Shaabi incursion into the disputed territories.
Following the incursion on October 16, thousands of Tuz Khurmatu’s mainly Kurdish population feared retaliatory attacks.
A video report by Rudaw showed Kurdish houses burnt, confiscated, and looted.
The Kurdish parliament has called the events “genocide” and an independent investigation carried out by the UN confirmed that there was targeted violence committed against the population.
“We have documented most of the damage and destruction inflicted on Khurmatu. The committee that we are forming is an investigative committee whose task is documenting damage and destruction of the town,” Hoshyar Abdulla, a Gorran MP told Rudaw.
He said that Khurmatu needs a neutral force, not multiple forces whose allegiances are to ethnicities and groups. He added that they will try to bring the United Nations representative with them.
The committee will be composed of 10 members and will have Kurds, Sunnis and members from the Shiite National Alliance members.
“The committee has been formed and the MPs have been selected. It only requires parliamentary approval. Whenever the parliament convenes, there will be a vote on it,” Salim Shawqy, an MP from the Shiite Muwatin (Citizen) bloc in the Iraqi parliament.
The committee has been tasked with ensuring “that the displaced families return as soon as possible, reveal the violations, and hold violators accountable,” read a statement published by the Iraqi parliament on January 8.
A division of Iraqi Rapid Division Forces and Iraqi Federal Police have been tasked by Baghdad with overseeing security of the multiethnic town.
The Kurdish population of the city is living in camps in the Kurdistan Region, and thousands are yet to return.
