UN: ISIS Captures Thousands, Executes Dozen Iraqi Villagers

A new report by the United Nations claims up to 3,000 Iraqi villagers were captured and 12 executed fleeing areas near Kirkuk by Islamic State militants on Thursday. The report comes on the heels of a statement from the Iraqi Observatory for Human Rights that said roughly 1,900 civilians had been captured by an estimated 100-120 Islamic militants.

Tens of civilians had been executed, and six burnt alive.

“UNHCR has received reports that ISIL captured on 4 August up to 3,000 IDPs (internally displaced people) from villages in Hawiga District in Kirkuk Governorate trying to flee to Kirkuk city. Reportedly, 12 of the IDPs have been killed in captivity,” the UNHCR report said.

The capture of the civilians comes two years after the August 2014 ISIS assault on the city of Sinjar, and the capture of over 3,000 Yazidi women and children, who have been pressed into sexual slavery or forced to fight as child soldiers. Overall, the fighting has displaced 3.4 million people in Iraq by July 2016.  Earlier this year, the State Department designated ISIS’ actions as genocide and the United States is leading a military coalition conducting air strikes against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, where the group seized broad swathes of territory in 2014.

However, it still controls its de facto capitals of Mosul in Iraq and Raqqa in Syria. Last month the U.N. appealed for $284 million to prepare aid for an assault on Mosul, as well as up to $1.8 billion to deal with the aftermath, though the U.N. Financial Tracking Service said no funds have been allocated. UNHCR has began construction at a site northeast of Mosul for 6,000 people and is preparing another northwest of the city for 15,000 for those in need of shelter.

“Although local authorities have suggested that returns to Falluja could begin in September, the Ministry of Migration and Displacement has stated that it may take another three months before conditions are conducive for large scale returns,” UNHCR said in a statement.

U.S.-backed Syrian rebels have been promised more weapons and air support by the government in Moscow, something U.S. President Barack Obama expressed skepticism over.

“I’m not confident that we can trust the Russians or Vladimir Putin,” Mr. Obama said, “which is why we have to test whether or not we can get an actual cessation of hostilities. That includes an end to the kinds of aerial bombing and civilian death and destruction that we’ve seen carried out by the Assad regime.”

Meanwhile, in Syria, the U.N. has been trying to secure a ceasefire on humanitarian grounds around the city of Aleppo, which has seen fierce fighting between anti-Assad rebels and government forces backed by Russian airpower and Iran, in order to allow some of the 250,000 trapped civilians to flee.