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(Strasbourg) “This prize that you are awarding to Nadia and myself today is one for every woman and girl who has been sexually enslaved by Daesh. It is a prize for all those around the world who are suffering violence and abuse. It is a recognition for the victims of the Yazidi genocide”, says Lamiya Aji Bashar in her address to the European Parliament in Strasbourg. She tells her story, the story of her friend Nadia Murad and of her village in Iraq which was completely destroyed by IS about two years ago. Men, women and children were massacred or forced into slavery. The European Parliament has awarded these two women – who eventually managed to escape and took refuge in Germany where they received medical help – the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought and Human Rights. The two guests, dressed in their traditional costumes, appeal for peace for their people and “a safe land for them to return home”. Lamiya narrates her ordeal and how she escaped death (a bomb blast left her with a disfigured face while her friend Kathrin got killed in the explosion) and now she asks for justice. She says that she was sold four times, the last time to a doctor in Baghdad who “raped her and also raped young girls aged 9 or 10”. She cries. “God helped me to overcome everything”. “Please, promise us – she says, addressing the MEPs – that these things will not happen again. We need Europe, the Yadizis and Christians in Iraq need to be protected” by the international community.


©  http://agensir.it/quotidiano/2016/12/13