ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A Yazidi woman has been rescued from the Islamic State (ISIS) captivity and returned to Iraq, a Kurdish official revealed on Tuesday.
Hussein Qaidi, head of the Yazidi rescue office, affiliated with the Kurdistan Region Presidency, told Rudaw on Tuesday that Tawaf Dawoud Chato “arrived in Iraq from Western Kurdistan [northeast Syria] today.”
He added that the Iraqi security forces are keeping her until she is returned to her hometown, Shingal.
When ISIS swept through the Yazidi heartland of Shingal in August 2014, committing genocide, the group abducted 6,417 women and children who were forced into sexual slavery and labour. Many have been rescued from al-Hol, the notorious camp that houses tens of thousands of ISIS families and supporters.
According to data provided by Qaidi’s office, 3,576 of the abducted Yazidis have been rescued so far.
Another Yazidi woman, Kovan Ido, was rescued from ISIS captivity in March and was reunited with her family in the Kurdistan Region. Ido was only 14 when she was abducted from her village in Shingal district during the extremist group's brutal offensive.
The recent rescue of Yazidi women return is a bittersweet moment for the Yazidi community. While they are overjoyed to have them back, they know that many other Yazidis are still missing and unaccounted for. The Yazidi community continues to call for international support in bringing the perpetrators of these crimes to justice and ensuring the safe return of all Yazidi abductees.