Human rights activist and the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize recipient, Nadia Murad, along with Yazidi-Americans, recently filed a civil lawsuit against the French industrial conglomerate Lafarge. The lawsuit was lodged in the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York. The allegations are presented under the civil provisions of the Anti-Terrorism Act, with the aim to secure compensation from Lafarge for its reported criminal conspiracy with the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
The Yazidi community is a Kurdish-speaking religious denomination dwelling predominantly in Iraq today, along with parts of Syria, Turkey, and Iran. In the mid-2010s, the Yazidis in the Sinjar region of northern Iraq faced severe attacks by ISIS, resulting in devastation of their religious community consisting of around 400,000 people through violent slaughter, sexual slavery, and other atrocities.
The Special Adviser and head of UNITAD, Karim Khan, stated in 2016 that there existed clear and convincing evidence implying these crimes against Yazidis qualified as genocide. Later in 2016, a resolution was passed by US lawmakers categorizing these Islamic State crimes as genocide.
In 2022, Lafarge, acclaimed as the world’s largest cement manufacturer, pled guilty in a New York federal court to charges related to providing a sum of $5.92 million to support the terrorist organizations ISIS and the al-Nusrah Front (ANF) between 2013 and 2014. In light of these facts, the current civil lawsuit in the federal court asserts Lafarge’s obligation to compensate the survivors.
Among those representing the plaintiffs in this lawsuit are the renowned human rights lawyer Amal Clooney and veteran US diplomat Lee Wolosky. Clooney has voiced the need for a formal investigation into the Islamic State’s genocide crimes and advocates seeking justice for the Yazidi community. Wolosky, in a statement, emphasized that, “While last year’s guilty plea was unprecedented, it is not enough. Lafarge needs to be held to account by those harmed by its unlawful conduct.”