Investigative Reports
The Demographic Change Haunts Minorities in the Nineveh Plain
Since Imad Zuhair (a pseudonym, 47 years old) returned to Qaraqosh, the center of the Hamdaniya district in the Nineveh Plain, after it was liberated from ISIS in late 2016, he has not stopped thinking about leaving the country as soon as he finds a suitable opportunity for himself and his small family, a wife and two daughters (9 and 11 years old). Like thousands of others, he was forced to flee to Erbil on August 7, 2014, after ISIS militants took control of the area and gave the residents two options: either pay the poultry farm (a tax) and…
Marginalization policies and lack of justice… The Yezidis of Sheikhan
After spending nearly four decades in Sheikhan, Hadi Dubbani (57 years old) left the country with his family, leaving the Yezidi town located north of Mosul to settle in Germany, as did dozens of his relatives. He says in a choked voice: "ISIS destroyed everything for us, it turned our lives upside down. I even left the land I never imagined I would leave. Many things pushed us to this decision: security, fear for the future, discrimination, and the absence of justice." Dubbani, who held the position of director of the Yezidi Endowment in Duhok Governorate in the Kurdistan Region…
Documents Found After the Fall of Assad Show Syrian Intelligence
A file discovered at General Intelligence Directorate headquarters details an operation to investigate SIRAJ, a Syrian journalist collective that is part of the OCCRP network.
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Oil fields and war remnants raise cancer rates in Basra
Dawai Naji (45 years old) from Basra, southern Iraq, lives in a whirlwind of anxiety about his mother, who is suffering from leukemia and has been hospitalized for weeks at Al-Sadr Teaching Hospital. He fears she might join his younger sister and nephew, who both died of cancer in 2014.…
Spread the “drugs” in the Kurdistan Region… the danger of
(A.S.), a 19-year-old young man from Duhok, did not complete his middle school education. At a young age, he was drawn into the world of drugs, influenced by friends he encountered during a time when his parents were unaware of his changing path, despite their persistent but unsuccessful efforts to…
Emigration Depletes the Christian Presence in Iraq: Security, Economy, and
Ihab, 37, a Christian displaced person in Dohuk, didn’t need much time to realize the reality awaiting him when he returned to his hometown of Tel esqof in the Nineveh Plain in the summer of 2017, after it was liberated from ISIS. His house, which he had completed building just…
“Alum and salt”… the way drug dealers get out of
Ibtihal Salem, a 22-year-old woman incarcerated in the Central Women’s Prison in Baghdad, openly acknowledges her 12 arrests for drug trafficking. She claims that after each detention, she managed to persuade the security forces to release her, with only her drugs being seized, while she paid bribes to secure her…
Cities sinking in pollutants… Water pollution chases the southern Iraqi
On the morning of February 16, 2022, Arabic teacher Ali Kazem experienced a sudden stomach ache while lecturing his students at school. Continuous pain, vomiting, and diarrhea prompted his colleagues to taking him to a hospital in the Soq Al-Shuyukh, south of Nasiriya, the center of Dhi Qar Governorate (360…
The masculinity of society prevents girls from proving their existence.
Every morning, Arouba, from the agricultural area of Swaib west of Baghdad, begins by milking her two cows, filling a few two-liter plastic containers with their milk, and then sending them with her little brother and a cousin to sell in the nearby Al-Rabi’a market. It’s a routine she has…
Pollution and health damage.. Iraqis compensate for the state’s deficit
Mohammed Hussein (54 years old) was forced to sell his house located in the Al-Ra’isah neighborhood east of the capital, Baghdad, in the summer of 2023, due to the noise and smoke from the diesel generator next to the wall his house, which collapsed due to the vibrations resulting from…
A Long History of Deprivation: Iraqi Women Denied Their Inheritance
Khadija Ahmed (79 years old) is the last surviving member of her wealthy family, which consisted of her parents and six siblings, three of whom were male. However, she did not receive any of the movable or immovable assets from her father’s estate, which was based on vast lands and…
