MOSCOW, August 10 (RIA Novosti) — Britain delivered Sunday the first batch of humanitarian aid for members of the Yezidi minority group stranded on a mountain in northern Iraq after fleeing jihadist militants, Chanel NewsAsia reported.
Amid tensions in the region, two British cargo planes airdropped humanitarian assistance, which included relief goods such as water and food.
Earlier on Saturday, the US Central Command announced it had made a third airdrop of water and food for Yezidis trapped on Mount Sinjar.
France is also planning to join the humanitarian campaign. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius arrived in Iraq to discuss the situation and oversee the delivery of French assistance.
Amnesty International adviser Donatella Rovera told the BBC that thousands of refugees had managed to leave the mountain but many still remained trapped in the region. According to the UN children’s agency, UNICEF, 56 Yezidi children had already died of dehydration.
US President Barack Obama said Saturday that the United States in cooperation with its allies was creating a "safe corridor" to transfer trapped Yezidis and save them from persecution.
Late on Thursday, Obama gave the green light to US airstrikes targeting positions of Islamic State (IS) militants fighting in Iraq against Kurdish forces defending the city of Erbil. The president also authorized humanitarian aid to Yezidi Kurds who, as Obama stated, face "genocide."
The Sunni group Islamic State (IS), previously fighting in Syria and known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS), seized large parts of Iraq in early June, ratcheting up tensions in the region. In late June, the Islamic State announced the establishment of a caliphate on the territories it had captured in Iraq and Syria.
