A mass funeral was held in Iraq for the first time for Yazidis murdered by Islamic State in 2014. 104 victims who initially ended up in mass graves have been identified and buried in the town of Kocho.
“Among the victims are my friends, neighbors, and two of my brothers. I still miss them every day,” said Yazidi activist and Nobel laureate Nadia Murad, who attended the solemn ceremony. “I am happy to honor them with a dignified funeral, but my heart is still bleeding for the thousands of families who still have loved ones lying in mass graves.”
The region around Kocho, in northern Iraq, was occupied by the Islamic State seven years ago. The terror group cracked down on the Yazidis, a religious minority in the Islamic country. Men were murdered, boys became child soldiers and girls and women became sex slaves.
More than 3,000 people were murdered, of the 7,000 women who were kidnapped, many have still not returned. 120,000 people fled. Murad won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2018 for her commitment to the population group. She herself was detained by IS for three months.
Track down perpetrators
After IS was expelled from the area, at least eighty mass graves were found. Nineteen of these have been excavated since March 2019. The remains have been brought to Baghdad for investigation by an international team.
Identifying the victims is difficult, as many Yazidis have become scattered across the country. In addition, some families have no survivors left to compare DNA with.
Murad calls for the work to continue. Not only to give the victims a dignified final resting place, but also to collect evidence about the perpetrators.
“Most of the perpetrators have not yet been identified, arrested and brought to trial,” Murad said. “They roam free and disrupt the dreams or freedom and security of my community.”
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