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Tracking Missed Yazidis Increasingly Harder Six Years After IS Genocide

Nisan Ahmado

   WASHINGTON - The Yazidi minority this week marked six years since the
   Islamic State (IS) attacked their homeland in northern Iraq. Their
   nightmare continues.

   Even after their territories were recaptured and IS was defeated,
   activists of the religious community say they are still looking for
   hundreds of their members who went missing during the genocidal
   campaign that began on August 3, 2014.

   One of the activists, Ali Hussein al-Khansouri, told VOA that many of
   the missing Yazidis must be "bought" from their kidnappers who demand
   amounts that continue to increase. He said that locating and smuggling
   out the missing Yazidis is becoming more difficult, especially as they
   seem to be scattered across conflict areas of Syria to as far as
   Turkey.

   Al-Khansouri, 34, who survived IS captivity, has rescued 43 kidnapped
   Yazidis across Iraq and Syria. His first mission in 2017 involved
   freeing an 8-year-old Yazidi girl from northwestern Syria under the
   al-Qaeda offshoot the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group.

   "I never imagined that I will be engaged in finding the missing
   Yazidis," said al-Khansouri, who in his quest is also hoping to track
   46 people from his extended family and relatives.

   "As time passed by and thousands of Yazidis remained missing, and
   because of the network of people I know, I was compelled to take
   action," he said.

   According to the Kidnapped Yazidis Rescue Office in Duhok, Kurdistan
   Region, 3,543 kidnapped Yazidis have been rescued with 2,800 still
   missing.

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