Amnesty International calls on Iraqi government to reveal fate of over 600 men abducted by militias

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The Iraqi government must act to reveal the fate of 643 missing men and boys abducted by state-sponsored militia forces amid the fight against Islamic State in 2016, said Amnesty International on Monday.

The missing men and boys were last seen fleeing Saqalawiya town in the Sunni-majority Anbar in early June 2016 when a group of militia forces, belonging to the Popular Mobilization Forces – an umbrella state-sponsored organization for mostly Shiite militias – put the men onto buses and trucks.

Since then, the fate of those men and boys has remained unknown despite investigative committees that had been formed by then Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar Al-Abadi.

“It has been seven years since then-Prime Minister Haidar Abadi formed a committee to investigate those disappearances and other abuses committed by the PMU during the Fallujah operations. But so far, the committee has not made any of its findings public and no one has been held accountable,” said Aya Majzoub, the Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa.

According to witnesses present at the scene, the militants were wearing uniforms and driving vehicles bearing the emblems of the PMF, the watchdog recalled in its report seven years ago.

“There is no bigger of a disaster than losing someone dear to you. We lost our loved ones, husbands, uncles, fathers. Everyone left. I don’t remember anything other than sadness,” one female relative of the victims told the watchdog.

International and local human rights groups on several occasions have reported violations committed by Iraqi security forces during the three-year fight against ISIS, whose self-proclaimed caliphate was brought down in 2017 in the country.