The Yezidi (also Yazidi) community is an ethnically Kurdish or an ethno-religious group indigenous to northern Mesopotamia. Yazidism is an ancient religion that is strictly endogamous. Even though they are ethnically Kurdish, Yazidis are a disctinct and independent religious community with their own unique culture. They live primarily in the Nineveh Province of Iraq. Additional communities exist as well in Armenia, Georgia, Turkey, Iran and Syria.

Starting in August 2014, the Yezidis were targeted by the „Islamic State of Iraq“ in its campaign to „purify“ the country from non-Sunni and non-Islamic influences.

Live in the studio is Seyedeh Behnaz Hosseini, an expert on Yezidi people in Iraq. She has completed her doctoral research with a focus on Yārsani minorities in Iran and migration to Sweden in the Department of Islamic Studies at the Institute of Oriental Studies at the University of Vienna. Her research interests include religious minorities in Iran and Iraq and forced migration. She visited camps with Yezidi women in North Iraq and in Baden-Württemberg a couple of weeks ago.

Hosseini will talk about the actual situation of Yeyzidi women who were able to escape from the so called ISIS and live now in camps, and the problems they are facing.

A broadcast by: Hamdi Abdullahi and Verena Bauer