TW for violence against women, sexual assaultVian Dakhil: Iraq’s only female Yazidi MP on the

TW for violence against women, sexual assaultVian Dakhil: Iraq’s only female Yazidi MP on the battle to save her people Vian Dakhil spends every waking moment working to rescue survivors of the carnage Isis has wreaked on the Yazidi people of northwest Iraq. Abigail Haworth joins her in Iraqi Kurdistan“Vian Dakhil is one of only two Yazidis in Iraq’s parliament. It seems obvious that it’s a lonely job; she’s also the only woman from the besieged minority in an assembly that is three-quarters male. (The other Yazidi politician, a man, is so inactive that few people seem to know he exists.) But I don’t realise how lonely her job is until I’ve spent a 14-hour day with her in northern Iraq, visiting Yazidi survivors of Isis carnage. It’s a relentless marathon of inhaling dust, kissing babies and comforting catastrophically traumatised, grief-wracked refugees like Hana.Dakhil has further reason to feel isolated: her efforts to help her fellow Yazidis have made her an assassination target. Ever since Isis attacked Yazidi territory around Mount Sinjar in northwest Iraq last August, the politician has been at the top of the Sunni extremist organisation’s hit list. “They hate professional, educated women. They hate me especially because I am speaking out and trying to rescue my sisters.”During their bloody rampage, Isis kidnapped an estimated 5,000 Yazidi women and children, the majority of whom remain captive today. Enslaved as malak yamiin (spoils of war), the women must endure repeated rape, forced marriage and violent abuse. Some are sold in open markets – virgins fetch the highest price – while others are given as “gifts” to fighters in Syria and elsewhere. To Isis’s irritation, Dakhil has lobbied tirelessly at home and abroad for more action and resources to help free them. “I have heard from government intelligence that I am now their most wanted woman. If they capture me, they will execute me at once.”Read the full piece hereBLESS this woman. -- source link

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