Some good news for trafficked women around the world!
Nadia Murad Basee Taha is a 23-year-old Yazidi woman who was kidnapped in Iraq by ISIS, sold, and raped. Recently she has been named the UN Office of Drugs and Crime Goodwill Ambassador for the Dignity of Survivors of Human Trafficking.
At a ceremony in New York, Ban Ki-moon, UN Secretary General acknowledged Nadia’s courage to give a voice to the voiceless.
Nadia’s story is now being told to the whole world.
Unfortunately, her experiences are not unfamiliar to thousands of other Yazidis who are still being killed because of their non-Islamic leanings.
“The night of August 3, 2014, everything changed. Daesh (ISIS) came to kidnap, to murder, to rape. This was genocide.In a matter of days if not hours, thousands of Yazidis were killed and thousands of women and children were taken just because they were Yazidis.
“I was taken to Mosul with others, I was used in the way they wanted to use me, I was not alone, and perhaps I was the lucky one. As time passed I found a way to escape whereas thousands of others could not. They are still captive.”
Human rights lawyer Amal Clooney said: “I am ashamed as a supporter of the United Nations that States are failing to prevent or even punish genocide because they find that their own interests get in the way. I am ashamed as a lawyer that there is not justice being done and merely a complaint being made about it. I am ashamed as a woman that girls like Nadia can have their bodies sold and used as battlefields.
“I am ashamed as a human being that we ignore their cries for help.”
This account first appeared at http://www.cathnews.com.au