MESOP : August 24 Report on North Iraq — Religious Shrines Destroyed

2014-08-24 17:28 GMT – Assyrian refugee in Ankawa, Iraq.(AINA) — The Hammurabi Human Rights Organization* has issued its latest report, dated August 24, 2014, on the situation in North Iraq.

Mosul

Residents contacted via telephone say life in the city is unbearable and discontent with ISIS is very high. Residents have expressed readiness to join any resistance that can liberate Mosul from the terrorists.

Thousands of students remains in limbo regarding the 2014-2015 school year, especially with ISIS orders that contradict entirely normal academic operations.

ISIS is delivering messages to some non-minority residents who fled from Mosul that they can return to the city, declare repentance and receive pardon so they can resume their daily lives. Upon returning, they are arrested and imprisoned. Attorney Najla Omari was arrested using this ruse, as well as tens of others.

ISIS has ordered some government departments to open, but sends its inspectors to ensure the staff is adhering to Sharia dress code imposed by them, and to severely punish the offenders, especially the women, who must wear the full veil from head to foot.

The Nineveh Plain

ISIS left the city of Telsqof in near total destruction. Homes and public buildings were looted and vandalized. All farm equipment was stolen. Muslim residents from surrounding villages assisted ISIS in the looting of Assyrian homes and business.

ISIS bombed the Yazidi shrines in Bashiqa, as well as shrines of the Kakaeya Sufi sect. All are destroyed.

Information from Yazidi families indicates that ISIS has placed captured nearly 15,000 Yazidis and placed them in schools and hospitals in Tal Afar and surrounding areas. They separated the men from the women. The captured Yazidis are starving. The Yazidi women are guarded by ISIS women. The prisoners are scattered in south Sinjar, Ghazlani camp and at the airport in AlGayara.

Relatives of Yazidi prisoners say they received a call from a captive woman from the village of Kojo who witnessed Yazidi men being killed, and the women being taken to Tal Afar.

See all HHRO reports.

* The Hammurabi Human Rights Organization (HHRO), an NGO based in Baghdad, Iraq, monitors the human rights situation in Iraq, particularly of minorities such as Assyrians, Turkmen, Yazidis and Shabak. Founded in 2005, HHRO works for human rights observation and documentation, in addition to implementation of humanitarian relief in Iraq.

HHRO works with various Iraqi and international institutions on variety of issues.

HHRO publishes annual reports on Human Rights situations focusing on Minorities. In 2013, HHRO was recognized and awarded as the best NGO by the United States State Department for its major achievements in the most difficult situations for the year 2012 in Baghdad.