NINEVEH, Iraq
A total of 68 Ezidis, stuck in the mountains in Iraq's Sinjar region, died of thirst and because of the heat, a local resident told The Anadolu Agency on Friday.
Ali Sinjari, a resident in the Sinjar region, added that 30 Ezidis, who had been trapped in the mountains for five days, managed to escape across the Syrian border by traveling at night and hiding during the day.
On Friday morning, 51 others were rescued by helicopters, which according to eyewitnesses, belonged to the Kurdish peshmergas,
One of the rescued, 67-year-old Hemse Micko told the AA that 24 members of his family still remained trapped in the mountains.
"Islamic State is killing every man they see, and kidnapping every woman they see, we are eye-witnesses," he added.
Thousands of Ezidis, a Kurdish ethno-religious community in northern Iraq targeted by Islamic State militants who consider them to be 'devil-worshippers,' have fled and are reported to be trapped in the mountains.
"Families who fled the area are in immediate need of urgent assistance, including up to 25,000 children who are now stranded in mountains surrounding Sinjar and are in dire need of humanitarian aid including drinking water and sanitation services," had said UNICEF in a statement released Tuesday.
More than a hundred Ezidis staged a rally in Washington D.C. before the White House on Thursday and demanded help from U.S. President Barack Obama.
Later that day, Obama authorized targeted air strikes to protect the American personnel in the northern city of Erbil -- capital of the Kurdish regional government -- and to help administer food and water supplies to Ezidi civilians who have sought refuge from Islamic State militants.
An Ezidi lawmaker said Tuesday that as many as 500 Ezidis -- who constitute the majority of the population in the Nineveh Province of northern Iraq -- had been killed by Islamic State militants in Sinjar, since Sunday, when they captured the peshmerga-controlled towns of Sinjar and Rabia in Mosul.
- Six Islamic State militants killed in Iraq's Diyala
Meanwhile, Iraqi forces said they had killed six Islamic State militants in clashes across the country's eastern province of Diyala late Thursday.
Six militants were killed after more than one hour of fighting north of Diyala's Muqdadiyah city between Islamic State fighters and Iraqi security forces, supported by local tribesmen, Diyala Police Chief Major General Jamil al-Shammari confirmed to the AA on Thursday.
Amid ongoing fierce clashes against the Iraqi army and Kurdish peshmerga forces, the Islamic State-led militants have recently tightened their grip on northern and eastern parts of Iraq, seizing control of Mosul's two Christian-populated towns -- Al-Hamdaniya and Bartella -- on Thursday along with another town that is home to 12,000 Turkish Kurds.
Around one million civilians have been displaced so far amid the ongoing clashes in the country.
www.aa.com.tr/en
