Shafaq News/ Kurdistan’s President, Nechirvan Barzani, welcomed the Belgian Parliament’s recognition of ISIS’s crime against the Yazidi Kurds in Iraq as a “genocide.”

“I welcome the recognition of Yezidi genocide by the Belgian Parliament. I urge parliaments of countries across the world to take similar actions as it is an important step to heal the wounds of our Yezidi community and achieve justice for the victims.” Barzani said on Twitter.

On 30 June 2021, the Foreign Relations Commission of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives unanimously approved a resolution to recognize ISIS's August 2014 massacre of thousands of Yazidi men and enslavement of thousands of Yazidi women and children as genocide.

The resolution, which would likely also pass with overwhelming approval in the Chamber itself, called on the Belgian government to increase its efforts to support victims, and prosecute perpetrators (either at the International Criminal Court or a new ad hoc tribunal).

ISIS carried out a genocide of Yazidis in the Sinjar area of northern Iraq in 2014. The genocide led to the expulsion, flight, and effective exile of the Yazidis from their lands.

 Thousands of Yazidi women and girls were forced into sexual slavery by the terrorist organization, and about five thousand Yazidi civilians were killed during what has been called a "forced conversion campaign.