ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The establishment of a Community-Based Truth Commission in the UK on Wednesday to address the failure of international governments and organisations to deliver justice for Yazidi victim-survivors, more than a decade after the genocide perpetrated by the Islamic State (ISIS).
Sources told Rudaw that the Truth Commission will “hear oral evidence from over 30 survivor-experts and specialists across three days” and seek to “generate pressure on governments and support urgent calls for domestic legislation, universal jurisdiction prosecutions” to “address the lack of action to prosecute genocide.”
The commission aims to address the failure of governments and bodies to deliver justice for Yazidi victim-survivors. A landmark report with urgent policy recommendations will be published and presented in the Houses of Parliament in 2027.
The landmark report aims to put pressure on governments to address the failure to deliver justice for Yazidi victim-survivors, drawing upon evidence from the hearings.
In June 2014, ISIS seized large parts of northern and western Iraq. By August, the group launched a brutal campaign against the Yazidi community in Shingal, killing an estimated 5,000 to 10,000 Yazidi men and older women, and abducting 6,000 to 7,000 women and girls for sexual slavery and human trafficking.
The United Nations officially recognizes the campaign against the Yazidis as a genocide.
The Commission stated that the “governments, including the UK, and bodies have repeatedly failed to act on their declarations to prevent and punish perpetrators.”
It further emphasized that “governments have a choice - stand by the Ezidi community until justice is delivered or do nothing and send a signal that genocide is no longer a crime that will be prevented and punished by the international community.”
In November, the commission will be chaired by the British human rights lawyer Baroness Helena Kennedy and evaluated by an international panel of commissioners from Europe, Africa and Asia.
Around 18,000 displaced families remain in camps across the Kurdistan Region. The majority of which are Yazidis from Shingal (Sinjar) district of Nineveh province housed in 22 camps, including 18 in Duhok province.
“We have nothing left in Iraq, only bones,” stated a female survivor-victim currently residing in Germany, home to the largest Yazidi diaspora community.
Hundreds of thousands of Yazidis and other Iraqis were displaced after the Islamic State swept across large parts of Iraq in 2014, including Shingal. While many families have returned in recent years, thousands remain in camps across the Kurdistan Region due to security concerns, damaged infrastructure, and a lack of services in their home areas.
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