Title: Crimes Against Kurds - The New Ethnic Cleansing of the Disputed Territories

AUTHORS AND RESEARCHERS
Jaya Srivastava
Susie Y. Hill
Anonymous Kurdish Author

SUPPORTING RESEARCHERS
Jeonghyun Kang
Alesandros Glaros
Yurim Choi
April Park
Wendy Oh
Scott Stevens

REPORT DESIGN
Amber Torrance
Dwayne McLean

COVER IMAGE
Satelite imagery courtesy of Google Earth
Social media images (collected in Crimes Against Kurds database)

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
On October 16, 2017 Iraq renewed ethnic cleansing of Kurdish and other minorities in the disputed territories. This report details abuses experienced by the Kurdish community in oil-rich Kirkuk and other disputed territories.
Iraqi state “Arabisation” policy displaces Kurdish populations, which are then repopulated with settlers from other parts of Iraq. This is accomplished through direct violence, the creation of security vacuums where abuses can be carried out by non-state offenders including militias and ISIS. Displacement is then enforced through threats and violations of Kurdish security, repression of Kurdish culture and language, discrimination in employment, and the harassment of journalists.
Crimes Against Kurds uses a mixed methodology of open source documentation and interviews to gather information about the human rights abuses taking place in Iraqi Kurdistan.
This report includes a preliminary legal analysis and documents collected by Crimes Against Kurds to show accountability is needed for perpetrators of these abuses. These perpetrators include the Iraqi state, Iranian-backed militias and ISIS. The report concludes with recommendations for national and international action to stop the ethnic cleansing and hold those responsible to account.
This investigation finds that the war crimes, and widespread and systematic ethnic cleansing policies amount to genocide and crimes against humanity. [1]