ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Officials and experts addressed ongoing threats faced by Yazidis and challenges faced in serving them justice during a conference in Erbil.
“It’s getting difficult to hold perpetrators accountable for their sexual and gender-based violence. I see this in the context of Nepal and also the case here in Kurdistan as well,” Mandira Sharma, a lawyer and human rights defender presenting a panel at the conference, told Rudaw on Tuesday.
The 6th Lalish Conference on Peace and Coexistence focused on the devastating impact of sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) in the context of genocide. The conference shed light on the political, economic, social, and psychological challenges faced by women and girls who survived the Islamic State’s (ISIS) atrocities.
Sharma’s homeland of Nepal endured a civil war lasting 10 years with cases of sexual violence and other abuses with few perpetrators held accountable.
Sharma and her colleagues have led efforts to represent victims, seeking justice through Nepalese courts, encouraging media coverage and international support to campaign for legal reforms.
States have legal obligations to hold perpetrators of serious human rights violations accountable, including SGBV, she said, adding when there is a threat to life, the government has a legal obligation to protect them.
“I am also hopeful that here in Iraq — as well where you already had an international investigative body functioning where they have already documented and investigated cases collecting evidence — that … someday we will be able to bring some perpetrators to justice,” Sharma said.
The United Nations Investigative Team to Promote Accountability for Crimes Committed by Da'esh/ISIL (UNITAD) announced last year that its mandate in Iraq would be ending on September 17, 2024, citing numerous significant challenges amid the closure of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI).
Humanitarians and justice organizations have criticized the rash decision to close UNITAD. Established in 2017, UNITAD has been an independent investigative team working to ensure accountability for international crimes committed by ISIS. Its work has included investigations, victims, evidence and awareness raising.
The Lalish conference brought together politicians, experts, and academics to discuss what the Iraqi government, Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), the international community, and NGOs have and can do to alleviate the plight of Yazidi girls and women who survived ISIS’ atrocities.
A key focus of the conference was to hold perpetrators of SGBV accountable. 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.
The KRG Commission of Investigation and Evidence Gathering (CIGE) is tasked with investigating and collecting evidence of ISIS crimes committed in the Shingal area and the Nineveh Plains to serve as a foundation for justice for Yazidis. Its mission continues despite the announced closure of UNITAD.
During the panel, a Yazidi survivor echoed the position that the Yazidis still do not feel comfortable returning to their homes when the perpetrators enjoy impunity.
“We very much welcome the fact that Iraq, as a whole, is engaged in addressing the horrors of Daesh,” said Klaus Streicher, Germany’s consul general to Erbil.
The Erbil office of the Iraqi Ministry of Displacement and Migration has ramped up efforts to implement Baghdad’s decision to close all internally displaced person (IDP) camps in the country, including in the Kurdistan Region, before July 30.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) last month warned against the planned closure of camps, stating that the Yazidi homeland of Sinjar (Shingal) remains unsafe and lacks basic services.
Many IDPs have been reluctant to return home. Some who voluntarily left camps to salvage their homes and livelihoods have been forced to return to camps, due to poor living conditions and lack of infrastructure.
Streicher noted that “although we generally share Iraq's interests that IDPs should not live in camps, we think that an extension of the timeframe would be very helpful to ensure humane return, integration or further relocation,” forewarning the possibility of secondary displacement and further aggravation of the instability of the area.
Following the ISIS takeover of large swathes of land in Iraq from 2014 to 2017, around 1.8 million Iraqis, predominantly from the Sunni-inhabited provinces and Baghdad, were sheltered in the Kurdistan Region.
Yazidis, a vulnerable population in Iraq, were subjected to countless heinous atrocities, including forced marriages, sexual violence, and massacres when ISIS captured Sinjar in 2014, bringing destruction to many villages and towns populated by the minority group. Many Yazidis were forced to flee to displacement camps across Iraq and the Kurdistan Region, where many still remain.
