Iraq crisis: Yazidis plead for international assistance as Australia prepares for humanitarian role
Thousands of Yazidi refugees who have fled a jihadist onslaught in Iraq have pleaded for international assistance, as Australia prepares to deliver humanitarian supplies to Iraq within days.In northern Iraq, around 30,000 Yazidi refugees remain trapped on Mount Sinjar, 11 days after fleeing from Islamic State (IS) militants.
Kurdish and Iraqi forces are continuing their efforts to free the Yazidis, while the United States and other Western aircraft have dropped supplies to help keep the displaced people alive.
The British government says a small number of helicopters are being sent to Iraq to help evacuate as many as possible.
Kieran Dwyer, who is with the United Nations in the Kurdish capital of Erbil, in northern Iraq, says the conditions on the mountain are extremely difficult.
"Temperatures are searing. It's 45 degrees or more in as cool a place as you can find," he said.
"And there's no shelter up there. So it's extremely difficult. There are many, many children that fled with their families, many elderly.
"They're distressed, traumatised. The food and water drops have been critical, but we can't be certain they've reached everybody."
Scores of Yazidi men and children evacuated from the mountain have held a protest to plead for more assistance.
"We have no bread, and very little water. We need help. We want to get out of here. We are so desperate we want to leave Iraq," one 30-year-old protester said.
Khodhr Hussein, 44, said: "We have very little food. The lucky ones get a meal a day. Many others go hungry.
"Many people are sleeping in the sun, the camp is not big enough for everybody."
A Kurdish official running the camp said the local authorities have a partnership with the United Nations' refugee agency (UNHCR).
Iraq's northernmost province is now home to 400,000 people who've been forced to flee their homes by Islamic State militants.
PM leaves door open to combat force in Iraq
The Australian military is expected to carry out its first mission to deliver humanitarian supplies to Iraq soon, with two C-130 aircraft due to carry out their first air drops over the next few days.
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Iraq crisis: Yazidis plead for international assistance as Australia prepares for humanitarian role
Updated 14 Aug 2014, 12:32amThu 14 Aug 2014, 12:32am
Displaced Yazidis walk towards the Syrian border Photo: The UN says it is proving extremely difficult to meet the needs of the fleeing Yazidi population. (Reuters: Rodi Said)
Related Story: Role in Iraq humanitarian 'at this stage', Abbott says
Map: Iraq
Thousands of Yazidi refugees who have fled a jihadist onslaught in Iraq have pleaded for international assistance, as Australia prepares to deliver humanitarian supplies to Iraq within days.
In northern Iraq, around 30,000 Yazidi refugees remain trapped on Mount Sinjar, 11 days after fleeing from Islamic State (IS) militants.
Kurdish and Iraqi forces are continuing their efforts to free the Yazidis, while the United States and other Western aircraft have dropped supplies to help keep the displaced people alive.
Plight of the Yazidis
Guardian correspondent Martin Chulov has just spent two days on the road reporting on the Yazidi refugees. He spoke to PM about their plight:
Tens of thousands of these desperate people are just streaming across the Nineveh plains into Syria and then walking across a long wooden bridge across a river into Iraqi Kurdistan.
Refuse everywhere; rags, plastic bags, people carrying their very last possessions. Most of them arriving in blazing 45-degree heat, looking understandably dehydrated and distressed.
We are told that people have died on this journey as they did on the mountain top during the early days of retreating up that mountain, being chased up that mountain, being chased up there by the IS insurgents when there was no food and water.
Most of those [people taken away to prisons in Sinja and Mosul] who have been detained appear to be women and there are consistent reports that many of these women, or girls, are being married off or sold as effectively as slaves.
I was sitting with a family on the border who had just crossed yesterday in blazing heat, sitting in the dirt, and a father received a phone call from his daughter who was in a prison in Central Mosul.
He'd been speaking to her most days. But yesterday the phone call suddenly turned desperate because she told him that she'd been told by her captors that she was to be sold that afternoon to an Islamic State man for a little more than $10.
You can imagine the father's distress hearing this, he was saying "Here I am sitting in another country, unable to do anything about this while my daughter gives me news such as this", and he simply broke down and his tears were spilling into the desert soil and it was an incredibly sad thing to watch.
Listen to more here
The British government says a small number of helicopters are being sent to Iraq to help evacuate as many as possible.
Kieran Dwyer, who is with the United Nations in the Kurdish capital of Erbil, in northern Iraq, says the conditions on the mountain are extremely difficult.
"Temperatures are searing. It's 45 degrees or more in as cool a place as you can find," he said.
"And there's no shelter up there. So it's extremely difficult. There are many, many children that fled with their families, many elderly.
"They're distressed, traumatised. The food and water drops have been critical, but we can't be certain they've reached everybody."
Scores of Yazidi men and children evacuated from the mountain have held a protest to plead for more assistance.
"We have no bread, and very little water. We need help. We want to get out of here. We are so desperate we want to leave Iraq," one 30-year-old protester said.
Khodhr Hussein, 44, said: "We have very little food. The lucky ones get a meal a day. Many others go hungry.
"Many people are sleeping in the sun, the camp is not big enough for everybody."
A Kurdish official running the camp said the local authorities have a partnership with the United Nations' refugee agency (UNHCR).
Iraq's northernmost province is now home to 400,000 people who've been forced to flee their homes by Islamic State militants.
PM leaves door open to combat force in Iraq
The Australian military is expected to carry out its first mission to deliver humanitarian supplies to Iraq soon, with two C-130 aircraft due to carry out their first air drops over the next few days.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott has also left the door open to possible military action.
Video: Explained: The political struggle for Baghdad (Middle East correspondent Matt Brown)
Defence Minister David Johnston said Australia had agreed to provide the humanitarian assistance but declined to rule out any military action.
"What we've seen is an extreme act of barbarism by a group of terrorists," he said.
"What the future holds, no-one can predict. The Australian Government has signed off on providing humanitarian relief and that is all."
The United States has ruled out sending combat troops back into the country.
European countries have also stepped up their humanitarian support, with the European Union increasing its annual aid budget for Iraq to $23 million.
The EU failed to agree on a joint position on supplying weapons to the Kurds, but said individual members could send arms in coordination with the government in Baghdad.
After a request from the Kurdish president, France agreed to immediately supply arms "to meet the urgent needs voiced by the Kurdish regional authorities".
"France intends to play an active role by providing, along with its partners and in liaison with the new Iraqi authorities, all the assistance required," president Francois Hollande said in a statement.
