DOHUK, Iraq (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Adeba Shaker, a 14-year-old from Iraqs minority Yazidi sect, recalled the day when she smiled again for the first time since her abduction by Islamic State militants. It was Oct. 28, 2014, when she was reunited with her younger sister who had also been kidnapped and sold in a market.Sixteen of Shakers relatives are still being held by Islamic State fighters who control large swathes of Iraq and Syria. They were abducted from their village in the Yazidi heartland of Sinjar in northwestern Iraq, and separated. Islamic State has hounded ethnic and religious minorities in northern Iraq since seizing the city of Mosul in June, killing and displacing thousands of Christians, Shiite Shabaks and Turkmen who lived for centuries in one of the most diverse parts of the Middle East. Hundreds of Yazidi women and girls have been captured, raped and tortured, and forced to convert to Islam and marry Islamic State followers, according to rights groups. Shaker was trafficked to the Syrian border and was given as a gift to fighters on the frontline. She was converted to Islam and forcibly married to one of them.
Posted on: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 08:10:15 +0000
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