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An Iraqi MP and United Nations relief workers today dismissed claims by the U.S. and the UK that the humanitarian crisis on Mount Sinjar was all but over. Yazidi MP Vian Dakhil claims some 70-80,000 refugees are still stranded on the mountain despite assertions from American and British leaders that they number only in their low thousands. President Barack Obama yesterday said the ten-day siege by the Islamic State had been 'broken' by missile strikes and humanitarian aid drops, allowing tens of thousands of Yazidis to escape. Downing Street also said the situation had improved so much that further aid...

On Thursday, the Pentagon revealed that the Yazidi minorities have been encircled by Islamic State forces on Mt. Sinjar for weeks were in much better shape. Military officials determined that select airstrikes on ISIS positions around the mountain had been successful, and some Yazidis had already evacuated the area. Defense officials determined that the success of contingency operations against ISIS in western Iraq indicated that no further action would need to be undertaken. In a press conference on Thursday, President Barack Obama confirmed that the mission to save the Yazidis had been a success. He added that, while the...

Yazidis fleeing a jihadist onslaught in northern Iraq say neighbours took up arms alongside their attackers, informing on members of the religious minority and helping the militants take over. "The (non-Iraqi) jihadists were Afghans, Bosnians, Arabs and even Americans and British fighters," said Sabah Hajji Hassan, a 68-year-old Yazidi who managed to flee the bloody offensive by the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group. "But the worst killings came from the people living among us, our (Sunni) Muslim neighbours." "The Metwet, Khawata and Kejala tribes -- they were all our neighbours. But they joined the IS, took heavy weapons from them,...

Or so says French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius: French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius has a message about Iraq for Barack Obama: Get back to the White House and do something. 'I know it is the holiday period in our Western countries,' Fabius told a radio interviewer Tuesday in France,' but when people are dying, you must come back from vacation.' Full-time workers in France are guaranteed a whopping five weeks of paid vacation every year, making his plea all the more urgent. Obama is on a family and golfing holiday in a ritzy neighborhood of Martha's Vineyard but says he...

President Obama said today the military and humanitarian assistance to protect an Iraqi religious minority group under siege by a terrorist organization had been a success. The airdrops delivered more than 114,000 meals and 35,000 gallons of fresh water to the Yadizis, Obama told reporters at a news conference during his vacation on Martha’s Vineyard. The Yazidis faced “a terrible choice” -- starve on the mountain or be killed by ISIL terrorists on the ground. “That’s when America came to help,” Obama said. “The bottom line is: the situation on the mountain has greatly improved and Americans should be very...

PKK fighters near Qandil Mountain in Northern Iraq News / Kurdistan PKK and YPG Hinder Peshmerga and US in Attacking Sinjar 14.08.2014  Mewan Dolamari BasNews, Erbil   On the night of August 13th, Kurdish Peshmerga forces with the support of US military advisers met near Sinjar Mountain, intent on forming a plan to attack Sinjar town which lay far below, crawling with IS militants that have since taken over the city.   However according to Peshmerga sources, their efforts have been hindered, , by guerrillas of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and Kurdish Communities Protection Units (YPG), who requested...

The prospect of having U.S. troops help stage a rescue mission in Iraq appears "far less likely" a Defense Department official said Wednesday following the return of a team of military personnel from a mountain where religious refugees had taken shelter. Earlier in the day, the White House appeared to walk a fine line on the question of an evacuation attempt as armed U.S. troops arrived in Islamic State-held territory in northern Iraq to plan a possible rescue mission while officials insisted they wouldBut Wednesday night Pentagon Press Secretary Rear Admiral John Kirby said the troops sent to Mt. Sinjar...

It looks like the US won't have to launch a mass evacuation of Iraqis trapped on a mountain after all. A small team of American military personnel who spent 24 hours on Mount Sinjar said US airstrikes seem to have done the trick—most of the trapped Yazidis who wanted to flee to safety have done so, reports the New York Times. As a result, defense chief Chuck Hagel said a rescue mission is "far less likely now," reports AP.