Hundreds of Turkomen children and women still at the hands of ISIS

ERBIL (K24) — The head of a Turkomen organisation said on Tuesday that up to 900 Shia Turkomen women and children are still in the hands of the Islamic State group in Iraq.

At a seminar entitled "Women, Terrorism and Media in the Middle East: the Kurdistan Example," sponsored by the Middle East Research Institute (MERI) in Erbil, Himan Ramzi, the head of the Tulay Organisation for Turkomen Affairs, said that IS crimes against the Turkomen minority are not reported enough in the local and international media.

Erbil-based Himan Ramzi told K24 that those kidnapped are mostly from the town and surrounding villages of Tal Afar, near Mosul, as well as Qaratepe and twelve other villages in the Tuz Khurmatu area, near Kirkuk. "We have so far documented that some 850 to 900 children and women are in the hands of ISIS. Only a dozen of them have been freed."

Ramzi said that her organisation and the Baghdad-based Inqad Network for Turkomen rights are collaborating to determine the exact number and identities of those kidnapped or killed.

Ramzi added that several months ago her organisation compiled reports and presented their findings to the Human Rights Committee of the Parliament of Iraqi Kurdistan and the Commission for the investigation of IS crimes at the Kurdistan Regional Government, "But we are yet to receive a reply whether they started working on the case," she added.

The head of the Turkomen organisation said she hopes their documentation of IS crimes against the Turkomen will be presented to future international courts. She also demands help and cooperation from Kurdistan Region authorities in identifying and recognising crimes of murder, kidnappings, torture and rape by IS since last year.