Eis het ontslag van Jozias van Aartsen

COPENHAGEN, Denmark – For many Western politicians speaking to Rudaw one thing is clear:  only military support can save the tens of thousands of Yezidis fleeing Islamic State (IS/ISIS) militants in Iraq and dying in their dozens on Mount Shingal.

"ISIS must be defeated by foreign military support to our Kurdish friends," said Harry van Bommel, a Socialist Party MP in the Dutch parliament.  “The Kurds and Yezidis on Shingal Mountain need our military support. If not, they are going to die.”

Charles Tannock, a European Parliament MP from Britain’s Conservative Party, called the situation “extremely worrying and horrifying in terms of the executions and beheadings of Yezidis and other groups.”

He believes it is now also necessary as a result of the humanitarian crisis to supply the Kurdistan Regional Government’s (KRG) Peshmerga forces with “sufficient military means to defend themselves.”

“The huge menace to regional stability and indeed global stability now by ISIS requires military assistance to friendly governments,” Tannock added. “That has to mean assisting the moderate and secular Erbil KRG government under President Barzani.”

Fredrik Malm, member of the Swedish Parliament for the Liberal People’s Party, feared things will get worse.

"ISIS does not respect any laws. They have killed many and abducted girls. This is a disaster. I fear they will kill Yezidis or try to force them to Islam," the Swedish politician said. “There is only one way to prevent them (ISIS) from coming into the area: namely military aid to the Kurds."

Another Swedish member of parliament, Ann-Margarethe Livh, shared that view.

“The Yezidis’ situation is so terrible. I think that the United Nations really has to act now.”

According to Bastiaan Belder,  Dutch MP at the European Parliament and a member of its foreign affairs committee, hoped that the Kurdistan Region could remain a safe haven for Christians, Yezidis and other minorities in Iraq.

“Therefore the international community should back by all means -- especially militarily -- the only authority in Iraq that can stop and defeat ISIS, and that is the KRG,” he said.

Kent Harstedt, a Swedish social democratic member of parliament, said: "It affects all of us, to hear about the terrible things from northern Iraq. We feel with the humans who are totally unprotected," he said and demanded action.

"We cannot passively watch or delegate the task to the Kurds. We must work with the UN and the Kurds, including by providing them with weapons, action and thus stand by our responsibility," Harstedt added.

Ozlem Cekic, a member of the Danish parliament for the Socialist People's Party who has Kurdish roots in Turkey, also called for greater Western support.

"The Kurds also got no help in Halabja and Anfal in the 1980s. This time Yezidis are getting purged because they have a different religion," she said, referring to the former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's genocide against the Kurds in the 1980s.

Christian Juhl, a member of the Danish parliament for the Unity List, praised the KRG for performing better than the rest of the troubled Middle East region.

"But now they are attacked by ISIS and therefore peacekeepers from the UN must intervene and stop this misery. The current situation is quite unacceptable," Juhl said.

Dirk Niebel, a German politician who served as Federal Minister of Economic Cooperation and Development, attracted attention by writing on his official Facebook profile: “The so-called ‘Islamic State’ is just going to slaughter the people of the Yezidis, the Christians. They had begun a long time ago. Where are all the guardians of virtue, do-gooders and peaceniks who demonstrated last week against Jews and Israel's right to self-defense?”

The European Christian Political Movement, a political association of parties and organizations active at different political levels in the European Union, urged the EU and UN to “act in the most effective way to save the minorities in the region.”

“It is clear that while the KRG is doing its utmost to help the people in need, the central Iraqi government has proved to be incapable to do anything to combat the ongoing crisis,” the movement said in a statement. “Neither has it given the KRG the support it needs and rightfully should get from the central government.”

It called on the EU and UN to urgently start direct cooperation with the KRG to help people fleeing IS reach safety as quick as possible.

“We believe that the humanitarian drama that is unfolding is more important than long-held political positions. Every child, woman and man that dies through this terror is one too many. The scale of this crisis is recognized; we want that the EU and UN to act accordingly.”

Dellawar Ajgeiy, the KRG representative in Brussels, described the statement as a positive step.