Report says Iraq forces turned on nearby villages after military victory
By Missy Ryan March 18
Shiite militias and Iraqi government forces burned and looted dozens of villages, abducting at least 11 local residents, in the wake of a U.S.-supported operation against the Islamic State last year, a human rights group has charged in a new report.
Human Rights Watch said that pro-government fighters, after U.S. airstrikes helped them break the extremist group’s siege of the town of Amerli late last summer, left a wake of destruction across at least 30 nearby villages in a manner that was “methodical and driven by revenge.”
Iranian-backed militias and government security forces appeared to have targeted Sunnis, Human Rights Watch found, either because they were suspected of supporting the Islamic State or simply because they came from the same sect as the militant group that controls large parts of Iraq and Syria.
Sarah Margon, Washington director for Human Rights Watch, said the abuses documented in the report should be a warning to the governments of Iraq, Iran, and the United States that new steps are required to ensure that they do not occur after other battles against the Islamic State, such as the one unfolding in the city of Tikrit.
More at link: Report says Iraq forces turned on nearby villages after military victory - The Washington Post
I'm glad it's the good guys doing this, because if ISIS did it, that would be horrible!
By Missy Ryan March 18
Shiite militias and Iraqi government forces burned and looted dozens of villages, abducting at least 11 local residents, in the wake of a U.S.-supported operation against the Islamic State last year, a human rights group has charged in a new report.
Human Rights Watch said that pro-government fighters, after U.S. airstrikes helped them break the extremist group’s siege of the town of Amerli late last summer, left a wake of destruction across at least 30 nearby villages in a manner that was “methodical and driven by revenge.”
Iranian-backed militias and government security forces appeared to have targeted Sunnis, Human Rights Watch found, either because they were suspected of supporting the Islamic State or simply because they came from the same sect as the militant group that controls large parts of Iraq and Syria.
Sarah Margon, Washington director for Human Rights Watch, said the abuses documented in the report should be a warning to the governments of Iraq, Iran, and the United States that new steps are required to ensure that they do not occur after other battles against the Islamic State, such as the one unfolding in the city of Tikrit.
More at link: Report says Iraq forces turned on nearby villages after military victory - The Washington Post
I'm glad it's the good guys doing this, because if ISIS did it, that would be horrible!
