By Nasir Ali DOHUK, Kurdistan Region — Kurdish authorities in Dohuk say at least 4,500 Kurdish Yezidis are still being held by Islamic State militants in Iraq and Syria despite rescue efforts that have so far secured the release of nearly 1,700 Yezidi captives. Rudaw met with two Yezidi sisters who escaped ISIS captivity in eastern Syria in early May following an operation by US Special Forces that led to the killing of a key ISIS commander known as Abu Sayyaf. At the time of the raid, the sisters were being held in a nearby home of another ISIS fighter. The two sisters, 26 and 24, are now living at the Shariya Camp outside Duhok in the Iraqi Kurdistan region. They told Rudaw a harrowing story about their time in ISIS captivity. “We were forced into buses, all of us, maybe 300 to 500 of us, women and much younger girls,” said the 26-year-old about the day they were abducted in Shingal in August 2014. Both women requested anonymity. “The buses made many stops on the way to Syria and at every stop a number of women were told to step out,” she said, adding that she suspects the women taken off the buses were given to ISIS militants along the route to Syria. She said many of the Yezidi women were also sold into slavery to Arab sheikhs and tribal leaders in the area, and some of the women were as young as 15. “We were moving all the time. They did not speak to us and when they did, they talked in an abusive language,” the younger sister remembered, her eyes filling with tears. “It was terrible in Homs,” she said, referring to ISIS’ de-facto capital. “We were given little food and water and were told to convert to Islam or they would kill us.” The Office of Yezidi Affairs in Dohuk, a government organization that releases daily figures and data about Yezidi captives, told Rudaw earlier it so far verified the deaths of 1,280 Yezidis who lost their lives while in ISIS captivity. “We have to have this point highlighted: 10 mass graves have been found since last summer with Yezidis shot at close range,” Hussein Koro, the head of the office, told Rudaw. The two sisters were being held near the house of Abu Sayyaf, a senior ISIS leader who had a leading role in overseeing ISIS oil and gas operations. A US Army spokesman said he was killed in a firefight after he resisted capture. “When the airstrike began, they hit close to where we were staying in the house, but we were unharmed,” the older sister said. “Many of the militants were killed that night. They were from all over the world.” An ISIS militant, she said, then moved the two sisters to Raqqa. Ransoms have been paid to secure the release of many Yezidi captives, according to Koro. After their release, the two sisters then crossed the border into Turkey and arrived in Dohuk several days later. They said many of their relatives are still in captivity in Syria, enduring appalling conditions. “No one knows the right number of those in captivity, but I would say thousands are still there,” said the eldest sister.
