PM Barzani welcomes German criminal ruling that recognizes ISIS genocide against Yezidis
ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Masrour Barzani on Wednesday welcomed the ruling of a German court the day before convicting an ISIS member on charges of genocide against members of the Yezidis (Ezidi) religious minority starting in 2014.
“I strongly welcome yesterday’s verdict by a German court to convict an ISIS member for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes,” Prime Minister Barzani said in a tweet.
A Frankfurt court on Tuesday handed a life sentence to an Iraqi national in the first verdict worldwide to specifically use the label "genocide," an important legal distinction.
Read More: Germany jails Iraqi jihadist for life for Yazidi genocide
Barzani also pointed out that “the verdict is a historic precedent and gives the global Yazidi community and survivors recourse to justice and recovery.”
I strongly welcome yesterday’s verdict by a German court to convict an ISIS member for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
— Masrour Barzani (@masrour_barzani) December 1, 2021
The verdict is a historic precedent and gives the global Yazidi community and survivors recourse to justice and recovery -mb.
This German court ruling is expected to be key in recognizing the atrocities committed by ISIS against the Yezidis, the first time in the world that a court has ruled that the atrocities committed against the group amount to genocide, as previously described by UN investigators.
The 2014 ascendance of ISIS and its subsequent violent assault on Sinjar (Shingal) led to the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Yezidis. Most of them fled to the autonomous Kurdistan Region, while others resettled to neighboring countries in the region or to Western states.
Others were not as lucky and remained stranded in the warzone, where they were subjected to atrocities and mass executions at the hands of the extremist group for years. ISIS militants forced women and girls into sexual slavery; kidnapped their children; forced religious conversions; executed scores of men; and abused, sold, and trafficked women and girls across the areas they controlled in Iraq and Syria.
In September, activists organized an official petition calling on the German government to formally recognize ISIS crimes against Ezidis as genocide.
Read More: Petition calls on Germany to formally recognize Yezidi genocide