Iran Holds up Yezidi Refugee Aid

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Iranian Kurdish activists collecting donations and humanitarian supplies for Yezidi refugees in the Kurdistan Region say the aid isn’t being delivered because of disputes with local authorities.

Sadoon Mazuchi, spokesman for the aid effort in Mahabad told Rudaw the mayor of the largely Kurdish city and the provincial governor of Urumiyeh are demanding that aid only be sent to a government-run refugee camp for Yezidis on the Sardasht-Qaladze border.

Aid organizers have rejected the demand, saying they want to either send the relief directly to refugees in Iraq’s Kurdistan Region or to the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Erbil.

Tens of thousands of Yezidi Kurdish refugees fled persecution by Islamic State (IS) extremists when they invaded the town of Shingal last month. Most ended up in Syria or Iraqi Kurdistan, but some have made their way to Kurdish areas in Turkey or Iran.

Mazuchi maintained that the Red Crescent in Mahabad was also unable to send aid to the refugees in Iraqi Kurdistan.

One aid worker in Mahabad said they have collected 10 trucks of humanitarian supplies and 700 million Iranian tomans ($23,000) in Kurdish-majority cities in western Iran. Although they have created a committee with the mayor and the Red Crescent to administer the aid, just two of the deliveries have made it to refugee camps in the Kurdistan Region.