UK government faces calls to shelter Yazidi refugees persecuted by Isis

MPs urge home secretary to extend resettlement scheme to members of Iraq’s Yazidi community, many of whom have suffered rape, torture and sexual slavery.

In a letter to Amber Rudd, a cross-party group of MPs has said that many Yazidi refugees from Iraq satisfy the “vulnerability criteria” of Syrian refugees due to the sexual violence they have experienced. However, their needs are at risk of being forgotten amid the humanitarian crisis caused by the military offensive in Mosul, the MPs warned.

The UN has condemned the murder, rape, torture and sexual slavery of Yazidis in Syria and Iraq, perpetrated by Isis, as genocide.The UK’s current vulnerable persons resettlement scheme (VPRS), which allows for 20,000 Syrians from neighbouring countries to enter Britain by 2020, “fails to account for the systematic persecution” of Yazidis, 90% of whom are Iraqi, said MPs from the all-party parliamentary group for international freedom of religion or belief.

Link to the article:https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2016/nov/26/uk-government-calls-shelter-yazidi-refugees-persecuted-isis