DUHOK, Kurdistan Region - Three Yezidi children who had been abducted by ISIS militants were reunited with their family in Duhok on Sunday.
One mother tightly hugged and held her daughter in her arms after three years of separation.
The mother with whom Rudaw interviewed said eight of her children taken by ISIS were still missing.
“All of our [other] children are under the hands of the enemies,” the mother said while holding her rescued little daughter, crying. “Yet my five sons, three daughters and husband are under ISIS. I do not know anything about them.”
One mother tightly hugged and held her daughter in her arms after three years of separation.
The mother with whom Rudaw interviewed said eight of her children taken by ISIS were still missing.
“All of our [other] children are under the hands of the enemies,” the mother said while holding her rescued little daughter, crying. “Yet my five sons, three daughters and husband are under ISIS. I do not know anything about them.”
VIDEO: Family reunion with missing Yezidi child in Duhok on December 17, 2017.
The three now returned Yezidis, ranging between the ages of 5 and 7, were living in Turkey with a Syrian family who had helped the children, according to the Embassy of Iraq in Ankara.
A Rudaw correspondent in the Turkish capital reported they spoke little Kurdish when interviewed, but appeared to have good knowledge of Turkish.
In Duhok, the girl struggled to express anything when spoken to by Rudaw reporter Ayub Nasri in Kurdish.
“We have been working for three-and-a-half months to rescue these three children,” Khairi Bozani, the head of the Yezidi affairs at the KRG Ministry of Religious Affairs told Rudaw.
Bozani said they would continue to work to rescue the many Kurdish Yezidis still with ISIS.
Parts of Shingal at different times have been under the control of ISIS, the Kurdistan Regional Government, the Government of Iraq, Hashd al-Shaabi paramilitias, and other groups.
Many ISIS families took the kidnapped Yezidi children in August 2014 and fled to Syria and elsewhere, so Bozani explained, their work has become more difficult.
“For example, these three kids were in Turkey and Turkey did not hand them over so easily. Therefore, we are forced to formally call for their handover and of course that requires time,” he stated.
Ali Atalan, a Yezidi member of the Turkish parliament from the pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) who visited the children in the embassy had described the three’s situation as tragic.
“You see, they have become mute, they have lost their native language,” explained Atalan. “They cannot speak their language. They may not even know their parents anymore. They do not know who they are, or where they come from.”
The children were given into the custody of a Yezidi religious leader in Turkey to accompany them back to their relatives in the Kurdistan Region, through Baghdad airport.
Nearly half of the Yezidis abducted by ISIS in August 2014 from Shingal and its surrounding areas are still being held captive or their fates remain unknown, according to the latest data released by the KRG’s ministry of religious affairs.
RELATED: KRG investigation of Yezidi genocide stopped by Iraqi takeover of Shingal
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