16,000 Iraqi Yazidis Escape From ISIL Assault to Turkey
KABUL: (Middle East Press) 16,000 Yazidi Kurds have taken refuge in Turkey to escape violence by the so-called Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) Takfiri terrorists, a top provincial official says.
Sirnak province Governor Hasan Ipek said on Saturday that some 2,000 refugees entered through border crossings while 14,000 others took other routes.
Many of the Yazidis, who are specifically targeted by the Takfiris, have fled to the southeastern Turkish province of Sirnak bordering Iraq.
“They are being provided with all kinds of health services and three times meals a day,” Ipek said, adding that the conditions of the refugees were “unfortunately” not up to scratch.
In the meantime, reports said hundreds of Yazidi women, kidnapped during recent attacks by ISIL, had been transferred to Syria, where they were sold and distributed among the terrorists as wives.
The so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said earlier in the day that at least 27 Yazidi women had been sold to the militants.
Iraq has been fighting the ISIL terrorists since they took control of Mosul on June 10. The occupation was followed by the fall of the city of Tikrit, located 140 kilometers (87 miles) northwest of the capital Baghdad. The control of Tikrit was later retaken by the Iraqi army.
