We were honored to have Farhad Shamo Roto, Founder and President of the Voice of Ezidis with us at our special session on the #Yazidi #Genocide at the Palace of Luxembourg.
Spreading awareness through his organization about the Yazidi people, Farhad Shamo Roto said:
“Ten years after the genocide, Yazidis have had very limited access to resettlement solidarity. We have hundreds of survivors in France who have no access to family unification. Mothers are separated from their children, and brothers cannot meet each other. […] This is a clear message from Yazidi survivors: they are seeking stability, and there has been no solution.”
We were honored to have Dr. Nagham Hasan, Gynecologist at her own private practice with us at our special session on the #Yazidi #Genocide at the Palace of Luxembourg.
Treating and supporting more than 1,200 Yazidi women who were victims of sex trafficking, Dr. Nagham Hasan shared her perspective:
“First, being a woman like them how can I tolerate hearing all these horrible stories? Second, being as a Yazidi woman as well, it made it difficult to see that my community is subjected to this violence without any cause, only because we are Yazidi.”
We were honored to have Elke Selter, Director of Program at ALIPH Foundation with us at our special session on the #Yazidi #Genocide at the Palace of Luxembourg.
With over 20 years of experience working on heritage in emergency situations with UNESCO, UNDP and the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS), Elke Selter spoke powerful words:
“[…] we believe that when a community is targeted, it goes hand in hand with targeting its heritage, identity, and history. What we are doing is trying to work with this part of the history and identity to restore it. There are many challenges because we prefer to do this together with the community. As mentioned, a large part of the community is not in Sinjar, for example. Heritage is closely tied to geography.”
Speech transcripts are available in the English, French, and Arabic languages on the Yazda website.
This special session was co-hosted by French Senator Nathalie Goulet, Yazda, and the Zovighian Public Office. The session took place on Monday, June 24, 2024 at the Luxembourg Palace in Paris, where we welcomed 15 speakers and panelists, a house of senators, survivors, and community members, and over 150 online attendees.
We thank you for being with us and helping us build together a safe and trusted place for a much-needed conversation on the plight of the Yazidi people in Sinjar and the world.