Two abducted Kurdish Kakai farmers found killed in Khanaqin

Two Kurdish farmers were found dead on early Monday in the Mekhas village in Khanaqin, Diyala province after they were allegedly abducted by the so-called Islamic State while they were harvesting their crops.

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Two Kurdish farmers were found dead on early Monday in the Mekhas village in Khanaqin, Diyala province after they were allegedly abducted by the so-called Islamic State while they were harvesting their crops.

The incident comes as the Islamic State’s recent attacks signal the terror group’s resurgence in the central provinces of Diyala and Salahuddin. Besides its hit-and-run attacks, the group’s long-practiced tactic is burning crops during harvest season.

Initially, “they were four Kurdish farmers harvesting when a number of suspected Islamic State militants attacked them,” a source told Kurdistan 24, the farmers were even harvesting their crops at night continuously in fear of the terrorist group’s arson acts. Later, the militants arrested two of the farmers, one of whom was the village head, the source said—the other two escaped.

Following an intensive search mission by Khanaqin’s district police on Monday morning, “the two farmers were found killed,” the source told Kurdistan 24.

Mekhas is a village inhabited by Kakai Kurds, a religious minority group, in Khanaqin district in Diyala province.

No one has yet claimed responsibility for the murder. However, a source in Khanaqin’s police directorate told Kurdistan 24 that the self-proclaimed Islamic State is suspected because they were involved in arson attacks on Kurdish farmers’ crop fields in villages across Khanaqin.

Top Kurdistan Region officials and Peshmerga commanders have issued repeated warnings to both the Iraqi government and the international community that the Islamic State remains active and capable of reasserting itself and re-emerging in the disputed territories to continue its campaign of violence.

A “security vacuum,” as Kurdish officials have described it, has made the disputed areas in Diyala, Salahuddin, and Kirkuk more vulnerable to Islamic State attacks.

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany

(Additional reporting by Harem Jaff)