CHARLES DE GAULLE: Twenty-seven Yazidi women arrived in France with their children on Wednesday from Iraq, fulfilling President Emmanuel Macron's pledge to take in 100 families from the ethnic group who were victims of assault by Daesh fighters.
The families were greeted at Charles de Gaulle airport outside Paris by Eric Chevallier, head of the foreign ministry's crisis management division, according to AFP reporters at the scene.
"Your children are going to go to school, you're going to make friends," Chevallier said, after they arrived from Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan.
Many of the children were still quite young, but others were adolescents, some dressed up in suits and ties for the occasion.
"What we've lived through these past five years is unimaginable. Today France is opening its arms to us, we can only be grateful," 30-year-old mother Turko told AFP.
"The first thing we would like to do is learn the language, send our children to school and learn French culture. Afterward our children will decide what they want to do with their lives."
The government is not releasing the names of the families, as they were long persecuted by Daesh fighters and many still fear for their lives.
Some were held in sexual slavery and struggled to regain a place in Yazidi society, others had to flee their homes as men died while trying to resist the IS advance.
"They have high expectations," said Giovanni Cassani, head of the International Organization for Migration in Erbil, who accompanied the women on their flight.
"On the one hand it was difficult to leave their country of origin, their family, their village, but there is also the excitement of starting a new life in a new country, with plenty of possibilities," he said.
The families were put on buses to be taken to different regions of France, officials said.
With the 27 women who arrived Wednesday, the foreign ministry said France had taken in 102 Yazidi families since last December.
Macron pledged in October 2018 to bring to France 100 Yazidi women who were targeted for sexual assault in northern Iraq beginning in 2014.
The offer came following a meeting in Paris with Nadia Murad after she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her campaign to end sexual violence as a weapon of war.
Murad was one of thousands of Yazidi women captured by extremists before they were driven out of Sinjar and other parts of Iraq, starting with campaigns by Kurdish forces backed by US-led coalition forces.
France takes in 27 more Yazidi women victims of Daesh
France takes in 27 more Yazidi women victims of Daesh
- The families were greeted at Charles de Gaulle airport
Thai villagers stay behind to guard empty homes as border clashes force mass evacuations
- Appointed by the local administration as Village Security Volunteers, they guarded the empty homes after many residents were forced to flee and with fewer security officials stationed nearby than usual
SURIN: Fighting that has flared along the Thai-Cambodian border has sent hundreds of thousands of Thai villagers fleeing from their homes close to the frontier since Monday. Their once-bustling communities have fallen largely silent except for the distant rumble of firing across the fields.
Yet in several of these villages, where normally a few hundred people live, a few dozen residents have chosen to stay behind despite the constant sounds of danger.
In a village in Buriram province, about 6 miles (10 kilometers) from the border, Somjai Kraiprakon and roughly 20 of her neighbors gathered around a roadside house, keeping watch over nearby homes. Appointed by the local administration as Village Security Volunteers, they guarded the empty homes after many residents were forced to flee and with fewer security officials stationed nearby than usual.
The latest large-scale fighting derailed a ceasefire pushed by US President Donald Trump, which halted five days of clashes in July triggered by longstanding territorial disputes. As of Saturday, around two dozen people had been reported killed in the renewed violence.
At a house on the village’s main intersection, now a meeting point, kitchen and sleeping area, explosions were a regular backdrop, with the constant risk of stray ammunition landing nearby. Somjai rarely flinched, but when the blasts came too close, she would sprint to a makeshift bunker beside the house, built on an empty plot from large precast concrete drainage pipes reinforced with dirt, sandbags and car tires.
She volunteered shortly after the July fighting. The 52-year-old completed a three-day training course with the district administration that included gun training and patrol techniques before she was appointed in November. The volunteer village guards are permitted to carry firearms provided by relevant authorities.
The army has emphasized the importance of volunteers like Somjai in this new phase of fighting, saying they help “provide the highest possible confidence and safety for the public.”
According to the army, volunteers “conduct patrols, establish checkpoints, stand guard inside villages, protect the property of local people, and monitor suspicious individuals who may attempt to infiltrate the area to gather intelligence.”
Somjai said the volunteer team performs all these duties, keeping close watch on strangers and patrolling at night to discourage thieves from entering abandoned homes. Her main responsibility, however, is not monitoring threats but caring for about 70 dogs left behind in the community.
“This is my priority. The other things I let the men take care of them. I’m not good at going out patrolling at night. Fortunately I’m good with dogs,” she said, adding that she first fed a few using her own money, but as donations began coming in, she was able to expand her feeding efforts.
In a nearby village, chief Praden Prajuabsook sat with about a dozen members of his village security team along a roadside in front of a local school. Around there, most shops were already closed and few cars could be seen passing once in a while.
Wearing navy blue uniforms and striped purple and blue scarves, the men and women chatted casually while keeping shotguns close and watching strangers carefully. Praden said the team stationed at different spots during the day, then started patrolling when night fell.
He noted that their guard duty is around the clock, and it comes with no compensation and relies entirely on volunteers. “We do it with our own will, for the brothers and sisters in our village,” he said.
Beyond guarding empty homes, Praden’s team, like Somjai, also ensures pets, cattle and other animals are fed. During the day, some members ride motorbikes from house to house to feed pigs, chickens and dogs left behind by their owners.
Although his village is close to the battlegrounds, Praden said he is not afraid of the sounds of fighting.
“We want our people to be safe… we are willing to safeguard the village for the people who have evacuated,” he said.
