Yazidi refugee woman urges government for help navigating new world
OTTAWA — A Yazidi refugee woman who was among the 1,200 Yazidis the Liberal government vowed to resettle in Canada says the women who have arrived here have been all but left on their own.
She’s urging the government to help them navigate their new world and to allow their family members to join them in Canada.
The Islamic State in Iraq and Syria has persecuted Yazidis, a minority religious sect mostly in northern Iraq. Adiba, 27, fled her home in northern Iraq’s Sinjar district after Islamic State militants massacred Yazidi villages, capturing women as sex slaves, and says some of her family members were among the estimated 10,000 Yazidis killed in the genocide. Her parents and her brother are still living in a camp in Iraqi Kurdistan and she did not use her last name out of fear for their safety.
She says she was living in a refugee camp when she learned the Canadian government would sponsor Yazidi women to move to Canada. As one of the first of the group to arrive, she spent her first few nights scared and alone in a hotel in Toronto until a non-profit organization offered to help.