The Yazidi Genocide: Aftermath for the Yazidi Women

The Syrian Accountability Project invites you all to a discussion on the aftermath of the Yazidi genocide. This discussion will revolve around a 2019 decision by the Yazidi Supreme Spiritual Council which has excluded Yazidi women from returning to their community if they chose to bring their children born out of ISIS rape. The Yazidis are a small, secular community in northern Iraq, in the Sinjar region. The decision they made was based on a religious one, where in Islam, the child retains the religion of the father. The Council concluded the children born of ISIS rape were not allowed as a member of the Yazidi community, leaving both the children and the mothers in a limbo. 

A team of writers from both Syracuse University College of Law and University of Michigan Law School collaborated in forming this white paper. The paper discusses the decision and how it affected the Yazidi women and children. It analyzes what it means for Iraq to be signatory to four different international treaties and how the legislation the country’s still working on can be altered to be inclusive of the Yazidi women in receiving reparations and support. 

Speakers

Moderator: Christopher G. Martz, Executive Director, Syracuse University College of Law

Hon. Stephen J. Rapp, U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues

Professor David M. Crane, Founding Chief Prosecutor of the International War Crimes Tribunal for West Africa

Professor James Johnson, Case Western Reserve University