Seventy-five Yazidi women and girls in the Shingal area, including some who were rescued from Islamic State (ISIS) enslavement, are taking part in a free 30-day driving training program put on by a group of local volunteers.
Kafiya Sulaiman, 18, is learning how to drive. She said that she and other girls and women from her family would not have been taken by ISIS militants if they had known how to drive. When ISIS militants attacked the Sinjar area in August 2014, she was at home with other female members of her family. Their family car was there, but none of the women knew how to drive so they could not flee. Only the men knew how to drive and none of them were home at the time.
"Had we known how to drive, we would not have been taken captive by Daesh," said Sulaiman, using the Arabic acronym of ISIS.
She believes it is crucial for Yazidi women and girls to learn how to drive.
Thousands of Yazidis were killed and taken captive when ISIS tore through Shingal and other parts of northern and western Iraq in 2014, committing genocide against the ethno-religious minority. The bodies of many of those killed still lie in mass graves and more than 2,800 Yazidi women abducted by the militants remain unaccounted for.
