ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — A recent bill that seeks to reintegrate Yezidi women and their children into society and to economically empowering them presented to the Iraqi parliament by President Barham Salih is “significant,” according to global activist NGO Yazda.
“We find the resolution to be significant, in fact this is the most significant piece of legislation ever with respect to the Yazidis in Iraq to be discussed within the framework for Iraq,” Yazda commented to Rudaw English on Tuesday.
Yazda hopes the bill might provide “a life with dignity” to the victims who still face “unimaginable hardship.”
The Iraqi presidency revealed on Sunday that it had sent the “Yazidi Survivors Bill” to parliament on March 28, 2019.
The bill “aims to compensate the survivors financially and psychologically, rehabilitate them, and take care of them, ensuring a dignified life for them…”
Iraq and the Kurdistan Region — where most Yezidis live as IDPs — lack sufficient psychosocial facilities. The gap hasn’t been adequately addressed, according to NGOs in the field, which say the focus is primarily on security, stability, and return
“… the bill also aims to use the necessary methods to integrate the survivors in the community and rehabilitating the infrastructure of their area”, added the readout.
Iraq state media network published the contents of the bill that focuses heavily on economic empowerment for Yazidi survivors and the children born fathered by Islamic State (ISIS) fighters.
The bill was issued due to “the psychological, social and health damages ISIS inflicted on those women and children” they kidnapped and to “resolve the negative effects” of survivors, providing them with their rights, and to internationally have the genocide recognized.
“We also find two crucial clauses in the draft resolution: recognition of the crimes against Yazidi women and girls as genocide and a clear language to prevent amnesty for ISIS members involved in these crimes,” Yazda added.
The bill stipulates the establishment of a Directorate for Yazidi Affairs, run by a Yazidi director general with a university degree and experience, based in Nineveh, tied to the Council of Ministers with administrative and fiscal independence.
The bill identifies five of its goals: To rehabilitate and take care of the survivors, psychological and financial compensation, to provide “dignified” lives, to rebuild infrastructure in their areas, and to reintegrate them.
“We also hope that the geopolitical programs of Shingal will be addressed, as most Yezidis remain displaced without a prospective of return,” added Yazda.
A host of militias and official forces are in control of different parts of Shingal: the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK)-linked groups like the Shingal Protection Units (YBS), Iraqi Army, Provincial Police, Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Peshmerga linked forces, Ezidkhan, and the Hashd al-Shaabi.
Recently, clashes have erupted twice between the Iraqi Army and YBS forces, causing fear among the populace as multiple members of both sides were killed.
The proposed Yazidi Affairs Directorate is to compile data on the survivors, take care of the survivors, provide them with “safe shelters” and housing, and “resolve the legal status of the surviving mothers’ children…”
A “Court of First Instance” is to be set up to resolve the citizenship documents of the children.
Also, the directorate is to provide educational opportunities for the survivors and their children, job opportunities, health centers for treating the survivors, and special clinics for psychological, social and professional care.
“The survivors are to be given priority in public employment opportunities,” it reads.
“Whom the provisions of this bill encompasses are to be given a monthly salary no less than twice the minimum retirement pension as stipulated in the Unified Pensions Law number 9 of the year 2014,” it added.
The female survivors are also to be given a piece of residential land or a free housing compound.
The bill sets August 3 of every year as a national commemoration date of the crimes committed against the Yezidis. The Ministry of Culture and relevant authorities are to “immortalize” the victims by building statues, sculptures and exhibitions on the commemoration dates.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Iraq’s Human Rights Commission is to work on having the crime recognized as a genocide internationally “to cooperate in handing over the criminals to be put on trial in Iraq,” and those complicit in the crime can never have amnesty or a pardon.
Iraqi PM Adil Abdul-Mahdi on March 12 announced that Yezidi survivors would receive 2 million dinars ($1,680) in compensation — independent of the president’s announcement.
“In the Ministry of Immigration and Migrants, the allocation of grants of 2 million dinars to Yezidi captives, whose number exceeds or is close to 800 captives, has been finalized,” Abdul-Mahdi said during a weekly press conference.
The United Nations Investigative Team for the Promotion of Accountability for Crimes Committed by ISIS announced on April 1 that it would continue to investigate suspected Yezidi mass grave sites after successful digs with heir Iraqi partners in March.