BEHDINAN – Kurdistan Communities Union (KCK) Executive Council Co-Presidency commended the South Kurdistan Parliament for recognizing the August 3 ISIS attack as a genocide, and pointed out that the decision should be expanded.
KCK Executive Council Co-Presidency issued a written statement and said, “This decision should be assumed by the Iraqi parliament, the United Nations, the European Union and institutions of all democratic countries as well as their parliaments.”
The KCK statement includes the following:
“The South Kurdistan Parliament has recognized the August 3 ISIS attack against Shengal where they massacred Yazidis, abducted thousands of women and children and tore hundreds of thousands of people from their lands as a genocide. We commend the South Kurdistan Parliament for their decision to do so.
This decision should be assumed by the Iraqi Parliament, the United Nations, European Union and institutions of all democratic countries as well as their parliaments.
The Yazidi Genocide was against a faith, and it is a Kurdish genocide. As diverse faiths of the Middle East are attempted to be annihilated, so is the Kurdish people. The anti-Kurdish president of the Turkish state expresses this idea through his motto, one nation one homeland, one state one flag. Tayyip Erdogan’s ‘one’s include one faith and one language. He does not voice the latter two as that would expose him. But this is how his ideology and politics manifests.
The Shengal Genocide has shown that precautions are needed so Yazidis are never subjected to massacres and genocides again. The onus is on Kurdish political parties and the current Iraqi government first. Humanity at large and institutions like the UN are also responsible in avoiding such attacks against Yazidis.
When ISIS attacked, Yazidis had no self-government where they made decisions about their own lives, or a self-defense force. If they did, they would have resisted with all they had and defended their lands and children.
As such, the Federal Kurdistan Parliament, after recognizing the ISIS attack as a genocide, must put forth a will to establish autonomy with defense forces in Ezidxan (Yazidi land). Because this is the only way for Yazidis, the Kurds who have suffered the biggest number of attacks and massacres, to avoid the threat of genocide. The recognition of the August 3 attack as a genocide necessitates the recognition of Ezidxan’s autonomy. This autonomy must be guaranteed by law in Federal Kurdistan and the Iraqi Constitution. The historic responsibility to Yazidis necessitates this. The 74th genocide faced by the Yazidi people can thusly be understood correctly.
As we commend the Federal Kurdistan Parliament for their decision on the genocide, we urge them to take a common stance against attacks on diverse faiths, cultures and ethnicities in all of the Middle East, wherever they may happen and whoever may be committing them, and to stand against attacks together with the Kurdish people and its resistance forces.”
