Around 400 people attended the protest at Shingal's Sharaf al-Din, a shrine for the Yezidi ethnoreligious community that calls the area home.
“Shingal has been through so much suffering and adversity, we want peace and security to be enforced,” said Khalaf Hadi, mayor of Kolka village in Shingal district, Nineveh province.
There were at least 3 other protests in different camps around Duhok province, where most Yezidis displaced from Shingal live.
Shingal, the heartland of Iraq's Yezidi community, was overrun in 2014 by the Islamic State. The terror group committed a brutal genocide against the Yezidis, targeting them for their non-Islamic faith. Six years on, much of Shingal still lies in ruins.
Security in the area currently handled by a number of armed groups and militias, including the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF, also known as Hashd al-Shaabi), the Shingal Resistance Units (YBS, linked to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party), Iraqi army, federal police, Yezidkhan Protection Forces (founded by a local Yezidi leader), and Peshmerga.
Erbil and Baghdad struck a deal for the governance and security of the Shingal area early last month. Under the deal, security for the region is to be provided by forces made up of the local population, but under federal government control.
Attendees of the protest told Rudaw that militias are endangering local women and children.
Many people “from Siba (Sheikh Khdr), Tal Ozer, Grzark, Hayali… don’t dare come back because of the existence PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party), they are scared for their girls” protester Zerifa Ahmed said.
Another protester, Harbia Hassan, asked that the militias be removed from Shingal and for mass graves containing the bodies of Yezidis killed by ISIS to be exhumed.
Children aren't attending school, and some "are forced to hold weapons,” Harbia said.
Approximately 6,418 Yezidis were kidnapped when ISIS overran Shingal. Women and young girls were sold into sexual slavery, with young boys forced to fight for the terror group. According to the Office for Yezidi Abductees' Affairs, 3,542 of those kidnapped have been rescued.
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