Turkey to build camp inside Iraq for Yazidis

ANKARA

Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community look for clothes to wear among items provided by a charity organization at the Nowruz camp, in Derike, Syria, Aug. 12. AP Photo / Khalid Mohammed

Turkey’s disaster agency will set up a tent city in Zakho, northern Iraq, to host around 16,000 Yazidi people who fled the Sinjar region amid ongoing attacks by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

The layout plan for the city has already been drafted, Anadolu Agency reported, citing sources from the Prime Ministry’s Disaster and Emergency Management Directorate (AFAD), which will build the camp. The agency said the camp will “consist of hotel-tents.”

Some 30,000 to 40,000 Yazidis have fled to Syria, while around 100,000 more have sought refuge in Zakho.

“There are currently around 6,500 Yazidis seeking shelter near the border,” AFAD said. The agency is also planning to send four trucks of humanitarian aid to the region in order to meet the essential requirements of the displaced minority group.

ISIL militants captured Sinjar and Rabia in Nineveh province last week, forcing thousands of Turkmen, Arabs, Christians and Yazidis to flee.    

Some 2,000 Yazidis from Iraq crossed the Habur border seeking refuge in Turkey. The refugees have been placed in tents and post-earthquake houses in the region.

The Turkish government decided to shelter Yazidi refugees in Silopi in a camp near Mor Gabriel Monastery in Mardin which was set up earlier for Syriacs that have fled to Turkey. The municipality of the southeastern province of Şanlıurfa has also decided to set up a camp for 3,000 Yazidis.

The Turkish Red Crescent has provided 20,000 blankets and sleeping bags, and sent a truckload of biscuits and drinking water for Yazidi refugees to the Silopi district in the southeastern province of Şırnak. The aid is being distributed to the refugees under the supervision of AFAD, the agency said Aug. 13.

Turkey has also decided to set up a camp in Dohuk for Iraqi Turkmens fleeing from jihadist violence.
Meanwhile, a proposal by the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) for an inquiry into the problems of the Yazidis was rejected in Turkey’s Parliament.

Meanwhile, another government agency, the Turkish International Cooperation and Development Agency (TİKA), will produce prefabricated houses to be sent to Gazans whose houses have been destroyed in recent Israeli attacks, Deputy Prime Minister Emrullah İşler announced on his Twitter account. The deputy said the initiative came upon an order from President-elect Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.