01. Yazidi Genocide Commemoration 2020 | Keynote - Mr. Haidar Elias

Yazidi Genocide Commemoration 2020 | Keynote - Mr. Haidar Elias 02.08.2020 We were honored to have Mr. Haidar Elias, President of Yazda Organization with us on the occasion of the Sixth Annual Commemoration of the #YazidiGenocide. Mr. Haidar Elias, President of Yazda Organization spoke with incredible energy: “We want to applaud you and all survivors of this genocide for your unique ability, your resilience and your strength.” “This event is for remembering what has happened to this community in 2014. Enslavement of women and female children, mass killings, forced displacement of an entire community, and destruction of homes, religious temples and houses of worship.” “This event is also about the plight of this community that has spent six years in IDP and refugee camps with limited access to the simplest services. It is about over 2,800 missing women and children. It is about the absence of justice, accountability, and reparation. It is about the basic rights of minorities who are constantly facing baseless discrimination.” “That community is returning and restarting their life and rebuilding their destroyed homes which is an incredibly difficult task. Today, our efforts will be directed to advocacy for creating a safe and habitable environment for those families who are returning.” “In order to rescue the community from this ongoing genocide. We need some profound and practical steps from the Iraq and Kurdistan governments, as well as the international community to ensure that justice is served properly, destroyed areas are built, missing women and children are rescued, and that Yazidis and all other minorities are protected in their ancestral homeland.” Speech transcripts are available in the English and Arabic languages in our commemoration documentation on security and justice for the Yazidi people and minorities in Iraq. The Sixth Annual Commemoration of the #YazidiGenocide was held under the patronage and the participation of the President of the Republic of Iraq, His Excellency Dr. Barham Salih. The two-day event took place on Zoom on August 2-3, 2020 and was hosted by Yazda in partnership with The Zovighian Partnership. We welcomed 41 speakers and panelists with over 482 delegates and more than 50,000 live online followers. We thank you for being with us and helping us build together a safe and trusted space for needed debates to plant new foundations for immediate action.