Swiss parliament recognizes ISIS crimes against Yazidis as genocide News
Peter Mosimann, Copyrighted free use, via Wikimedia Commons
Swiss parliament recognizes ISIS crimes against Yazidis as genocide

In a significant move, the Swiss parliament has officially recognized the atrocities committed by the Islamic State (ISIS) against Iraq’s Yazidi community as constituting genocide. The motion, passed on Tuesday, condemns the systematic expulsion, rape and murder of Yazidis, and the destruction of their cultural sites.

The majority of the Swiss National Council voted in favor of the bill, with 105 lawmakers supporting recognition of the genocide and 61 opposing it. The parliament’s statement emphasized the need for international reparations and justice for victims.

The ISIS attack on the Yazidi heartland of Shingal in August 2014 resulted in an estimated 5,000 deaths and the abduction of 6,417 women and children, who were forced into sexual slavery and labor. The United Nations Investigative Team to Promote Accountability for Crimes Committed by Da’esh/ISIL (UNITAD) has classified the attack as clear evidence of genocidal intent.

Switzerland joins several other countries and bodies, including the European Parliament and a United Nations Commission of Inquiry, in recognizing the ISIS crimes against Yazidis as genocide. The National Assembly of Armenia,the Australian parliament, the Canadian parliament, the United States House of Representatives and the United Kingdom are all considering motions on the Yazidi genocide.

Kurdish leaders have consistently condemned the atrocities and stressed the need for justice and reparations for the victims. Efforts to support the Yazidi community are ongoing, including international rescue missions and initiatives to reunite abducted Yazidis with their families. The Kurdistan Regional Government and the Iraqi federal government are working together to return displaced Yazidis to their homes in Shingal (Sinjar) and provide them with necessary support through The Sinjar Agreement, signed to stabilize the Sinjar district and return displaced people. 

This comes as Swedish prosecutors in December indicted a 52-year-old woman for crimes against humanity, genocide, and war crimes over accusations of enslaving Yazidi women in Syria between August 2014 and December 2016. On December 11, a Dutch court further convicted an ISIS member, Hasna A. for crimes against a Yazidi woman. Hasna A was charged with slavery, membership in a terrorist organization, promoting terrorist crimes, and endangering her minor son. There have been similar convictions in Germany.

THIS DAY @ LAW

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On March 11, 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev became the leader of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, following the death of Konstantin Chernenko. He soon announced that he would hold arms-reduction negotiations in Geneva with the United States. Gorbachev also used his tenure to liberalize the economy and social structure of the USSR, eventually leading to the abatement of the Soviet Union. In 1990, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace.

Read documents and interviews from the 1990 USA-USSR Summit.

Confederate Constitution adopted

On March 11, 1861, seven former US states adopted the Constitution of the Confederate States of America, which closely followed the language, if not necessarily the purport, of the original US Constitution. Section 9 (4) of the Confederate Constitution read "No bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves shall be passed," enshrining the right to own slaves as fundamental law.

ICC holds first meeting

The war crimes court known as the International Criminal Court (ICC) swore in its first batch of judges on March 11, 2003. The meeting took place eight months after the ratification of the court's Rome Statute. Then-UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said of the occasion: It has taken mankind many years to reach this moment. By the solemn undertaking they have given here in open court, these 11 men and seven women, representing all regions of the world and many different cultures and legal traditions, have made themselves the embodiment of our collective conscience. Learn more about the work of the ICC.