8 min read
She was abused while held captive by IS. Now in Australia, Hayam wants justice
It's been a decade since IS group fighters took Hayam Mihi and many others from her hometown. Some were killed, others were enslaved. Now in Australia, she's among those calling on the government to help deliver justice.
Published 3 August 2024 3:29pm
By Jennifer Scherer, Mayada Kordy Khalil
Source: SBS News
Image: Hayam Mihi was 16 years old when she was taken captive by the self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS) group. (SBS News.)
Warning: This story contains distressing content.
Hayam Mihi was taken by militants of the self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS) group from her northern Iraq hometown, Sinjar, when she was 16 years old and five months pregnant.
Mihi spent almost two years in IS group captivity, where she and others held by the militant group were "severely" mistreated and ordered to convert to the group's religion.
"They abused us, they wouldn’t let us eat, they would beat us, they would force themselves on us. I was pregnant, I suffered a lot," Mihi told SBS.
In the early hours of 3 August 2014, IS launched its attack across the Sinjar region which many Yazidis — — call home. More than 3,000 of them, mostly men and elderly women, were killed, according to the Public Library of Science journal.
At least 6,800 women and children were captured by IS group militants. Some were taken for sexual slavery, trafficking or to be trained as child soldiers. Approximately 2,800 are still missing.
The IS group's control of large areas of Iraq between 2014 and late 2017 has been described by the United Nations Human Rights Commission (OHCHR) as a "relentless campaign of terror and violence".
Multiple bodies — including the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic, mandated by the United Nations Human Rights Council — have recognised these acts as genocide.
'My captors threatened to sell me'
During Mihi’s captivity, she gave birth to her eldest son. After her labour, she said her captors gave her an ultimatum.
"An ISIS prince said either marry me or I’ll take your baby away … [and] sell me to someone else," she said, using another common acronym for the IS group.
"They took my baby away from me. I did not see him for seven days."
Hayam Mihi is still waiting for justice for what happened to her. Credit: SBS News
She said she was then reunited with her family and husband and lived in the Duhok refugee camp until receiving humanitarian visas allowing them to travel to Australia.
"They said Australia accepts IS survivors," Mihi said.
"I wanted to leave Iraq and I couldn't live there anymore because of what happened to us.
"Life was very difficult there, and our psychological state was bad, we applied, and the government accepted us."
They resettled in the NSW regional town of Wagga Wagga in late 2019 but a decade on from the horrors she experienced, Mihi is still waiting for justice.
"All the crimes that ISIS has committed, so far nothing has been done," she said.
"They destroyed the world. What they did to the Yazidis, they wanted to break us only because of our religion.
"Our wish is that one day they will be prosecuted for what they have done to us."
Prosecuting IS group foreign fighters
It is estimated around 30,000 foreign fighters from at least 89 countries joined the IS group. This number reportedly includes more than 200 Australians.
Many of these countries, including Australia, are signatories of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.
Signatories of the statute are obligated to investigate and prosecute any of their citizens suspected of the crime of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes or the crime of aggression.
Susan Hutchinson is the architect of the Prosecute; don’t perpetrate campaign, which advocates to end impunity for sexual violence in armed conflict.
She's calling on the Australian government to investigate and prosecute Australians who fought with the IS group and may have perpetrated crimes punishable under the Rome Statute.
"The kind of violence that they () experienced at the hands of IS was extreme brutality," Hutchinson told SBS.
"The whole point of the principle of complementarity of the Rome Statute is that countries like Australia do our own investigations and prosecutions.
"At the moment, members of the Australian Defence Force are being held to a higher degree of accountability than people like those who joined ISIS and fought overseas for terrorist organisations and that is not okay."
A German court was the first to convict a member of the IS group for genocide in 2021.
The defendant, Taha al-Jumailly, was found to have purchased a Yazidi woman and her five-year-old daughter as slaves in 2015, and of leaving the girl to die of thirst.
He was also found guilty of crimes against humanity, war crimes and human trafficking, and was sentenced to life in prison.
The kind of violence that they (the Yazidis) experienced at the hands of ISIS was extreme brutality.Susan Hutchinson, architect of the Prosecute; don’t perpetrate campaign
According to Daniela Gavshon, the Australian director of Human Rights Watch, if countries don't prosecute IS group foreign fighters, there's a risk "that people don’t see that there is actually accountability".
"Unfortunately, what we've seen domestically in Iraq is that when anyone is prosecuted, they're prosecuted only for being members of ISIS, but they're not prosecuted for war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide," Gavshon told SBS.
"In Australia, we haven't had any prosecutions like that either."
In 2021, five Yazidi women brought a claim for compensation to the Australian High Court, which Gavshon said was the closest an Australian court has come to hearing a genocide, war crimes or crimes against humanity case against IS group members.
"Five women, who allege they were tortured and enslaved by an Australian man who had gone over to join ISIS ... brought a case for compensation against the Australian government," she said.
"Unfortunately, that case was not successful ... and so they have put in a complaint to the UN Committee against Torture."
A spokesperson from the Attorney-General's Department said the federal government strongly supported the International Criminal Court.
They said Australia has powers to investigate "core international crimes", such as war crimes and crimes against humanity, and pointed to an ongoing investigation into .
They said the government strongly condemned the violence and terrorism committed by the IS group and said that "robust frameworks" prohibited Australians from joining conflicts overseas and helped manage the return of foreign fighters.
"These provisions also assist to manage the threat to the Australian community posed by persons who have travelled to a declared area and may return to Australia with skills and intentions acquired from fighting or training with terrorist groups," the spokesperson said.
Family members still missing
Shammo Silo was away from his home village of Kocho in northern Iraq on 3 August 2014.
"I was at work as a truck driver," he told SBS.
"I called my family, my wife, I called the people in the village and when I called them, they told me that the Iraqi army has withdrawn and the Peshmergas have withdrawn.
"I was the only one from my family who wasn’t captured that day as I wasn’t home. And all the others were taken by IS."
Shammo Silo was working as a truck driver when the IS group attacked his village. Credit: SBS News.
"At the moment, my wife is still missing. They took my four daughters," he said.
"My father is still missing together with my two sons, and we don’t know anything about them."
Silo's daughters have since been freed.
His youngest daughter Iman was taken from Kocho at five years old. She was released from IS group captivity three years later and found living with a family loyal to the group in Türkiye.
Her father fought tirelessly to find his daughters and secure their release.
"I often remember and it gets me really upset," Iman told SBS.
Iman and her father Shammo light candles to commemorate 10 years since the Sinjar massacre. Credit: SBS News.
"If it never happened, I would probably still be with my family."
While Iman lives with her father and sister in Wagga Wagga, at least 200,000 Yazidis remain displaced in camps, fearful of returning to the Sinjar district where mass graves are still being unearthed.
"When this day approaches, the third of August, memories come back ... I remember that hour when they took our people away," Silo said.
"Justice is still pending; ten years have passed.
"Had there been law, justice, trials, and due process, we would have taken our rights … we are the ones who must pay the price; we lost our families.
"The people who inflicted this upon us ought to answer for their actions."
Produced in collaboration with journalist Mayada Kordy Khali from SBS Kurdish.
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