ERBIL, Kurdistan Region—A special UN commission charged with investigating violations committed by the Islamic State against the Yezidi minority in Syria has concluded that genocide occurred.
“Genocide has occurred and is ongoing,” said Paulo Pinheiro, chair of the UN Commission of Inquiry. “ISIS has subjected every Yezidi woman, child or man that it has captured to the most horrific of atrocities.”
The Commission was mandated to examine ISIS actions against the Yezidi people in Syria, where thousands of women and girls remain captive of the terrorist group. Its report, ‘They Came to Destroy: ISIS Crimes Against the Yazidis,’ was released on Thursday.
The report, based on interviews with survivors, medical personnel, journalists, smugglers, religious leaders, and activists, as well as extensive documentary information, concludes that ISIS committed genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes.
“ISIS has sought to erase the Yazidis through killings; sexual slavery, enslavement, torture and inhuman and degrading treatment and forcible transfer causing serious bodily and mental harm; the infliction of conditions of life that bring about a slow death; the imposition of measures to prevent Yazidi children from being born, including forced conversion of adults, the separation of Yazidi men and women, and mental trauma; and the transfer of Yazidi children from their own families and placing them with ISIS fighters, thereby cutting them off from beliefs and practices of their own religious community”, reads the report.
The genocide of the Yezidis has been widely condemned as the UN Commission joins the US government, the UK House of Commons, and the European Parliament in formal recognition of the crime.
With the acknowledgement that Islamic State violations of the Yezidi community are genocide, a next step is to ensure that nations have fulfilled their obligation to prevent the crime.
Under the Genocide Convention, states are obliged to take all measures possible to prevent or end the genocide.
The UN Commission, in their report, asserts that further investigation is needed to determine whether or not nations, including Iraq and Syria as well as the international community, fulfilled their obligations under the Genocide Convention.
Of particular concern for the Commission, “is an examination of the circumstances of the withdrawal of the Peshmerga from the Sinjar region as the ISIS attack commenced. Further, there is as yet no information available concerning any steps being taken by the Governments of Syria and Iraq to free Yazidi women and children being held by ISIS on their territory.”
Another challenge now facing the international community is how to bring the perpetrators to justice. The stumbling block is jurisdiction.
“The International Criminal Court (ICC) is, at present, the only international criminal tribunal that could have jurisdiction over ISIS crimes against the Yazidis,” the Commission’s report states.
For the ICC to open a case against ISIS, the matter would have to be referred to the court by one of the party states, meaning Iraq or Syria, or the UN Security Council. Neither Iraq nor Syria, however, is party to the Rome Statute, which is the treaty governing the ICC.
The only option for referral, therefore, is from the Security Council, which already failed to pass a resolution referring the Syria matter to the ICC after Russia and China vetoed the matter on May 22, 2014.
Trying another tactic, Yezidi advocacy NGOs Yazda and the Free Yezidi Foundation have argued that the ICC has personal jurisdiction to try individual members of the Islamic State who are citizens of countries that are a party to the Rome Statute. Individual foreign fighters could, they assert, be charged and tried.
Some individual perpetrators have been identified by the UN Commission, which says it has shared names and details with some national authorities.
Yazda and the Free Yezidi Foundation also argue that the identification of individual perpetrators of the genocide is not necessary in the preliminary stages of an ICC investigation, which can build a specific case based first on a general situation.
“As such it is sufficient at this stage that the communication presents serious information demonstrating that incidents of crimes committed are within the material jurisdiction of the Court and were committed by a group including individuals who were nationals of State Parties - irrespective of the capacity in which they were acting,” reads their September 2015 submission to the ICC.
The ICC has not publicly responded to the submission and has not yet formally opened an investigation into the Yezidi genocide matter.
Yazda, along with Nadia Murad, a Yezidi survivor of ISIS, recently announced that they are being represented by human rights lawyer Amal Clooney in an attempt to bring the case to the ICC.
Resolving the matter of jurisdiction will likely be a lengthy process if the UN Security Council does not make a referral to the court.
An alternative option floated by the UN Commission is the establishment of “an ad hoc tribunal to prosecute the myriad of violations of international law committed during the non-international armed conflict.”
Barring an international option, the UN Commission believes that justice for the Yezidi community will most likely be found in domestic courts. There is a precedent for this.
On May 30, a special court established within the domestic courts of Senegal issued a guilty verdict against former Chadian dictator Hissène Habré on the charges of crimes against humanity, war crimes, and torture. Many in Africa believe that war crimes suspects from African nations should be prosecuted on the continent, rather than at the ICC, which they believe is biased against African nations.
A similar solution may be found for the prosecution of Islamic State leaders and militants.
“[W]ith no path to international criminal justice available, it is likely that the first such prosecution of ISIS crimes against the Yazidis will take place in a domestic jurisdiction,” stated the UN Commission, noting the need for states to enact laws against genocide so that individual nations can try Islamic State militants in domestic courts.
“Genocide has occurred and is ongoing,” said Paulo Pinheiro, chair of the UN Commission of Inquiry. “ISIS has subjected every Yezidi woman, child or man that it has captured to the most horrific of atrocities.”
The Commission was mandated to examine ISIS actions against the Yezidi people in Syria, where thousands of women and girls remain captive of the terrorist group. Its report, ‘They Came to Destroy: ISIS Crimes Against the Yazidis,’ was released on Thursday.
The report, based on interviews with survivors, medical personnel, journalists, smugglers, religious leaders, and activists, as well as extensive documentary information, concludes that ISIS committed genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes.
“ISIS has sought to erase the Yazidis through killings; sexual slavery, enslavement, torture and inhuman and degrading treatment and forcible transfer causing serious bodily and mental harm; the infliction of conditions of life that bring about a slow death; the imposition of measures to prevent Yazidi children from being born, including forced conversion of adults, the separation of Yazidi men and women, and mental trauma; and the transfer of Yazidi children from their own families and placing them with ISIS fighters, thereby cutting them off from beliefs and practices of their own religious community”, reads the report.
The genocide of the Yezidis has been widely condemned as the UN Commission joins the US government, the UK House of Commons, and the European Parliament in formal recognition of the crime.
With the acknowledgement that Islamic State violations of the Yezidi community are genocide, a next step is to ensure that nations have fulfilled their obligation to prevent the crime.
Under the Genocide Convention, states are obliged to take all measures possible to prevent or end the genocide.
The UN Commission, in their report, asserts that further investigation is needed to determine whether or not nations, including Iraq and Syria as well as the international community, fulfilled their obligations under the Genocide Convention.
Of particular concern for the Commission, “is an examination of the circumstances of the withdrawal of the Peshmerga from the Sinjar region as the ISIS attack commenced. Further, there is as yet no information available concerning any steps being taken by the Governments of Syria and Iraq to free Yazidi women and children being held by ISIS on their territory.”
Another challenge now facing the international community is how to bring the perpetrators to justice. The stumbling block is jurisdiction.
“The International Criminal Court (ICC) is, at present, the only international criminal tribunal that could have jurisdiction over ISIS crimes against the Yazidis,” the Commission’s report states.
For the ICC to open a case against ISIS, the matter would have to be referred to the court by one of the party states, meaning Iraq or Syria, or the UN Security Council. Neither Iraq nor Syria, however, is party to the Rome Statute, which is the treaty governing the ICC.
The only option for referral, therefore, is from the Security Council, which already failed to pass a resolution referring the Syria matter to the ICC after Russia and China vetoed the matter on May 22, 2014.
Trying another tactic, Yezidi advocacy NGOs Yazda and the Free Yezidi Foundation have argued that the ICC has personal jurisdiction to try individual members of the Islamic State who are citizens of countries that are a party to the Rome Statute. Individual foreign fighters could, they assert, be charged and tried.
Some individual perpetrators have been identified by the UN Commission, which says it has shared names and details with some national authorities.
Yazda and the Free Yezidi Foundation also argue that the identification of individual perpetrators of the genocide is not necessary in the preliminary stages of an ICC investigation, which can build a specific case based first on a general situation.
“As such it is sufficient at this stage that the communication presents serious information demonstrating that incidents of crimes committed are within the material jurisdiction of the Court and were committed by a group including individuals who were nationals of State Parties - irrespective of the capacity in which they were acting,” reads their September 2015 submission to the ICC.
The ICC has not publicly responded to the submission and has not yet formally opened an investigation into the Yezidi genocide matter.
Yazda, along with Nadia Murad, a Yezidi survivor of ISIS, recently announced that they are being represented by human rights lawyer Amal Clooney in an attempt to bring the case to the ICC.
Resolving the matter of jurisdiction will likely be a lengthy process if the UN Security Council does not make a referral to the court.
An alternative option floated by the UN Commission is the establishment of “an ad hoc tribunal to prosecute the myriad of violations of international law committed during the non-international armed conflict.”
Barring an international option, the UN Commission believes that justice for the Yezidi community will most likely be found in domestic courts. There is a precedent for this.
On May 30, a special court established within the domestic courts of Senegal issued a guilty verdict against former Chadian dictator Hissène Habré on the charges of crimes against humanity, war crimes, and torture. Many in Africa believe that war crimes suspects from African nations should be prosecuted on the continent, rather than at the ICC, which they believe is biased against African nations.
A similar solution may be found for the prosecution of Islamic State leaders and militants.
“[W]ith no path to international criminal justice available, it is likely that the first such prosecution of ISIS crimes against the Yazidis will take place in a domestic jurisdiction,” stated the UN Commission, noting the need for states to enact laws against genocide so that individual nations can try Islamic State militants in domestic courts.
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