PKK Forces Yazidis to Pay Money to Smuggle Them Into Syria or Turkey

07.09.2014 – Nuwar Faqie – BasNews, Erbil – After the attack of Islamic State (IS) militants on Sinjar Town and the subsequent displacement of thousands of people, fighters of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) have put a price of between $50 and $200 to smuggle Yazidis into Turkey or Syria.

Sharwan Ibrahim, a Yazidi refugee from Sinjar, told BasNews that PKK fighters force refugees to pay $50 – 200 to smuggle them into Syrian Kurdistan or Turkey. ’The price varies from one place to another. To smugglie someone to Turkey, they demand $200, $100 to Syrian Kurdistan and $50 to other villages around Syria,’ said Ibrahim. An eyewitness spoke to BasNews that after the mass killings and displacement of thousands of Yazidis, PKK fighters were deployed to the borders and have prepared a committee to transfer Sinjar refugees through areas around the Zewa river up to the Zaxo border in Duhok  and have established a number of checkpoints. SInce Islamic State fighters tookover the town of Sinjar and other areas in Northern Iraq, PKK and YPG fighters entered the area and has set up camps and reports has emerged that PKK has forced Kurdish Yazidi youths to take up arms against IS Militants, or they won’t get the aids that have been sent to them from all aorund the world.