Yazidi Rescue Office: 3,595 Abductees Rescued Since 2014, 2,822 Still Missing
Hussein Qaidi, director of the Office for the Rescue of Abducted Yazidis under the Kurdistan Regional Government, released updated figures to the Iraqi News Agency (INA) on November 14: of the 6,417 Iraqi Yazidis abducted when the Islamic State (ISIS) attacked Sinjar and surrounding villages in August 2014, 3,595 have been rescued to date, while 2,822 remain unaccounted for.
Qaidi said more than half of those still missing are women and girls, alongside a substantial number of children who were forcibly separated from their families and indoctrinated.
He said most recent rescues have taken place inside Syria, indicating that significant numbers of the missing remain in Syrian territory, particularly in and around the Al-Hol detention camp, as well as among ISIS-affiliated families inside Iraq. Iraqi authorities have not ruled out that some victims were trafficked beyond the borders of Iraq and Syria.
The Yazidis are an ancient minority community in northern Iraq. When ISIS overran the Yazidi homeland around Sinjar in August 2014, large numbers of civilians were killed and thousands of women and children were abducted, in events a United Nations investigative body later found to constitute genocide. The rescue office was set up in the aftermath to trace and free the abducted, and its work continues.
(Source: Iraqi News Agency)
Source: Iraqi News Agency
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：伊拉克北部 Lalish 的雅兹迪神庙锥形尖塔（资料照片）。Luay Qassim 摄，CC BY-SA 4.0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / Photo: The conical spires of the Yazidi temple at Lalish, northern Iraq (file photo). Luay Qassim, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
