NADIA MURAD
Murad was living in northern Iraq when in 2014 Islamic State fighters set on her village, killing several hundred — burying them in mass graves — and abducting many of the young women. It is estimated that 3,000 Yazidi girls and women were kidnapped by the terrorists and sold into sex slavery.
While held captive by ISIL, Murad was handed off among the terrorists and repeatedly raped. She escaped after three months with the help of a Sunni family.
In a book — The Last Girl — she tells of her captivity, the loss of her family and her eventual escape. She called her captivity “a slow, painful death — of the body and the soul.”
In 2016, Murad, who becomes the first Iraqi to win the Nobel Peace Prize, was named as a United Nations “goodwill ambassador” on the issue of survivors of human trafficking.
She has since travelled around the world campaigning for the documentation of war crimes and the rescue of Yazidis still held by ISIL fighters. In 2016, then-U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said the Islamic State had been responsible for “genocide” against Yazidis and several other groups living under its control.
At 25, she is also the second-youngest person to win a Nobel Peace Prize, after Malala Yousafzai, who in 2014 won the prize at age 17.
“This is not something I chose,” Murad said in an interview last year. “Somebody had to tell these stories. It’s not easy.”
On Friday, Murad said she would share her award “with Yazidis, Iraqis, Kurds, other persecuted minorities and all of the countless victims of sexual violence around the world.”
She said, “As a survivor, I am grateful for this opportunity to draw international attention to the plight of the Yazidi people, who have suffered unimaginable crimes” under the Islamic State.
She said she would be thinking of her mother, who was slain by ISIL along with six of her brothers, and other Yazidis who were killed.
“We must work together with determination — to prove that genocidal campaigns will not only fail, but lead to accountability for the perpetrators and justice for the survivors,” she said.
Rights advocates were thrilled with the choice of this year’s winners.
“We’re talking (about) two ordinary citizens, at one level, who show that ordinary people can do extraordinary things. And they’ve shown a kind of political will that we’re not seeing in our political leaders right now to make a difference,” said Kumi Naidoo, head of Amnesty International.
Iraqi President Bahram Saleh praised the award for Murad, saying on Twitter that it was an “honour for all Iraqis who fought terrorism and bigotry.”
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, meanwhile, tweeted a link to the Nobel announcement, commenting that “the timing of this topic is extraordinary as we fight for the end of #ViolenceAgainstWomen.”
The Yazidis are an ancient religious minority, falsely branded as devil-worshippers by Sunni Muslim extremists. ISIL, adopting a radical interpretation of ancient Islamic texts, declared that Yazidi women and even young girls could be taken as sex slaves.
Before ISIL rose to power, the Yazidis were the subjects of one of the deadliest single attacks after the 2003 U.S.led invasion of Iraq. On Aug 14, 2007, four suicide truck bombs targeted Yazidi villages north of the country, killing some 400 people and wounding many more. The attack was carried by out by the Islamic State in Iraq, ISIL’s predecessor.
SOMEBODY HAD TO TELL THESE STORIES. IT’S NOT EASY.