Iraqi Yazidis still long to return to their homeland since being forced to leave due to Daesh attacks in 2014 in the Sinjar district of Mosul, according to Yazidi community leader Mir Hazım Tahsin Beg. Yet, the PKK terrorist group’s presence remains a major threat.
"It’s not only the PKK terrorizing the northern Iraqi town of Sinjar, other militia groups like Hashd al-Shaabi (Popular Mobilization Forces – PMF), also pose a threat," Mir Beg told Anadolu Agency (AA) during his first official visit to Türkiye on Wednesday.
"They’re disturbing the peace there," Mir Beg said, noting that the political and social situation in Sinjar was "not good" and that the Irbil and Baghdad administrations were "failing to push the PKK out of Sinjar" as was promised to the Yazidi community.
Yazidis are a Kurmanji-speaking endogamous minority group indigenous to Western Asia, with most of the population living in Mosul and Duhok in northern Iraq, with diaspora communities in Germany, Syria, Türkiye, Georgia and Armenia. The group has faced persecution throughout history, most recently from Daesh in 2014, which killed and kidnapped more than 6,500 Yazidi women and children, as well as displaced more than 500,000 people.
The Yazidis are also present in Türkiye, which Mir Beg argued, as a secular country would "never discriminate between languages, religions or races."
As part of his visit, Mir Beg met with Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, along with various other officials. "I made a request for the facilitation of a formal residence for Yazidis in Türkiye as well," Mir Beg informed. "Türkiye is strong in both political and military terms. We want Türkiye’s relations with Iraq to be good and also want the Iraqi-Syrian border to be secured," he added.
Sinjar is wedged between Türkiye to the north and Syria to the west, making it a highly strategic zone long coveted by both the central government in Baghdad and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in the north. Despite being administered by the Iraqi city of Mosul, it is considered a disputed enclave with the KRG. It fell under the control of the PKK and pro-Iran Iraqi militias following Daesh’s invasion in 2014.
According to Mir Beg, however, the central Iraqi government has so far failed to extend a helping hand to the Yazidis, to an extent that "not even a single minister" accepted the community’s invitation to "come and see the state of Yazidi refugees in camps," while the KRG provided support for the camps.
He repeated his call to the Iraqi government to take note of the situation in the camps. "Yazidis are an economically disadvantaged group," Mir Beg noted, claiming that in 2014, the KRG rescued 3,500 people from Daesh by paying nearly $20,000 for each woman and child. "These people were very well-received and integrated into our community," Mir Beg said.
The return of Yazidis to their regions, except for Sinjar, has been facilitated, he argued, saying he believes if the Iraqi government wishes "they could improve the situation" in Sinjar.
In an Aug. 3, 2014 attack on the district, Daesh kidnapped and killed thousands of Yazidis, besides detaining many in areas they held. Some 300,000 people lived in Sinjar before the attacks, two-thirds of them Yazidis, and the rest Sunni Kurds and Arabs. Daesh had been active in the Iraqi provinces of Salahuddin, Anbar, Kirkuk and Diyala, at a time when the federal government was struggling to contain attacks by the terrorist group, launching security and military operations in the country's northern, western and eastern regions. In 2017, Iraq declared victory over Daesh after reclaiming all territories the terrorist group controlled since the summer of 2014, estimated to be about one-third of the country.
The PKK terrorist group managed to establish a foothold in Sinjar in mid-2014 under the pretext of protecting the local Yazidi community from Daesh. Since then, the PKK has reportedly established a new base in Sinjar for its logistical and command-and-control activities.
The Sinjar agreement signed under the auspices of the United Nations between the central government in Baghdad and the KRG on Oct. 9, 2020, envisaged clearing the region of PKK terrorists. However, it never took effect, allowing the PKK to roam free in the territory to this day. The group is reportedly trying to turn the district into a "second Qandil."
Mir Beg once again called on international powers for the implementation of the U.N.-mediated deal, saying, "We want Yazidis to return to their homes."
On the political side, the Yazidi community currently has a quota for members in the Iraqi parliament, but not in the KRG, according to Mir Beg.
The community made a formal request to be granted seats at the KRG about three years ago, yet, Kurdish political parties "failed to reach a consensus" about the Yazidi quota, Mir Beg explained.
The displaced Yazidis still await the opportunity to return to their homes due to the PKK’s presence, which also interferes with reconstruction efforts in the region.
Northern Iraq is known as the location of many PKK terrorist hideouts and bases from where they carry out attacks in Türkiye. The Turkish military regularly conducts cross-border operations in northern Iraq. Türkiye has long been stressing that it will not tolerate terrorist threats posed against its national security and has called on Iraqi officials to take necessary steps to eliminate the terrorist group. Ankara previously noted that if the expected steps were not taken, it would not shy away from targeting terrorist threats.