Jolie is on an official two-day UN trip to the autonomous region of Iraq. PHOTO: FILE
LOS ANGELES: Actor-director Angelina Jolie, who is also the United Nations (UN) refugee agency’s special envoy, visited refugee camps to meet survivors of attacks by the militant group Islamic State (IS) in northern Iraq. She is on an official two-day UN trip to the autonomous Kurdistan region of the country.
The camp is currently home to thousands of members of the Yazidi ethno-religious community, and other refugees who have been forced to abandon their homes in Mosul, which is under IS siege. On Sunday, Jolie travelled to the Khanke camp, which was set up in December 2014, and hosts displaced Iraqis who fled after surviving kidnappings and other attacks by IS.
“Children whose parents were murdered are now here unaccompanied. There is a 19-year-old working and is the sole provider for his seven siblings,” Jolie said, according to the UN. “I have met mothers whose children have been kidnapped by IS. As a parent, I couldn’t imagine a greater horror. They are overwhelmed by thoughts of what is happening to their children,” she added.
The mother of six expressed despair over the sufferings of the survivors, stating, “Too many innocent people are paying the price of the conflict in Syria and spread of extremism.” Jolie, who is married to actor Brad Pitt, also expressed her deepest sympathy to the family of Haruna Yukawa, a Japanese hostage who was reportedly murdered in Syria on Saturday.
Published in The Express Tribune, January 28th, 2015.
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