Former Virginia Congressman Frank R. Wolf has written a letter to both US President Barack Obama and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, telling the two men to recognise the ongoing slaughter, torture, and rape of Christians, Yazidis, and other religious minorities at the hands of Islamic State militants.
"Genocidal intent can clearly be seen in Islamic State's ideology and mission which is directed toward the creation of a global caliphate that has been purged of every man, woman and child deemed to be an 'unbeliever' through either forced conversion or death," Wolf wrote in the letter.
"In Iraq, this has manifested most clearly in the insurgency's actions against Christians and Yazidis. They have been killed, tortured, kidnapped, raped, sold into slavery, and forcibly removed from their homeland," he added.
Wolf urged Obama and Ban not to turn their backs any longer from the religious minorities who are suffering from genocide. He lamented that these people—Christians, Yazidis, Shabak, Turkmen and other religious and ethnic minority groups—also suffer from bodily and mental harm, prevention of births, and the transference of children.
He highlighted Article II of the 1948 Convention, which demands that the world take immediate action to stop the destruction of human life and desecration of religious freedom—acts carried out by the ISIS.
Religious leaders such as Pope Francis have condemned ISIS actions as genocide and have offered their sympathies to those who have been slaughtered or harmed in any way by the jihadist group in the Middle East and Africa.
"Today we are dismayed to see how in the Middle East and elsewhere in the world many of our brothers and sisters are persecuted, tortured and killed for their faith in Jesus," Pope Francis earlier said. "In this Third World War, waged piecemeal, which we are now experiencing, a form of genocide is taking place, and it must end."
