Amal Clooney, the British human-rights lawyer, told the Security Council that now is its “Nuremberg moment” to push for prosecuting cases of sexual violence in conflict. Nadia Murad, right, a Yazidi, had been held by ISIS in Iraq. In 2018, Murad won the Nobel Peace Prize with Dr. Denis Mukwege, a Congolese, for their work to end sexual atrocities.
ISIS fighters entering Raqqa in 2013. In 2014, the jihadists committed genocide, including rape, against the Yazidi population in their ancestral home in northern Iraq. The authors list six explicit ways that rape as a weapon of war can be tackled in work on peace and stability. CREATIVE COMMONS
“Sympathy is not enough..”
Ten days ago, while attending the opening ceremony of a conference in Vienna commemorating the 25thanniversary of the Vienna Declaration ofHuman Rights, I was struck by the simple words and sad demeanor of Nadia Murad, a Yazidi survivor of ISIS captivity featuring sexual slavery and institutionalized rape. [For an illuminating commentary on the Yazidi ordeal see Cathy Otten, “Slaves of Isis: the long walk of the Yazidi women,” The Guardian,25 July 2017]
