80 Iraqi villagers ‘massacred’ by Islamic militants for refusing to convert to Islam

Islamic militants in northern Iraq have massacred at least 80 men from the Yazidi faith in a village and abducted women and children, reports say.

Islamic State (IS) fighters entered Kocho, 45km (30 miles) from Sinjar, on Friday afternoon, reportedly telling men to convert to Islam or die.

According to previous reports,  residents had been given until Thursday to convert to Islam or face execution, in what is becoming a common ISIS ultimatum.



The group’s atrocities against non-Sunni Muslims have shocked the international community into action, the BBC reports.

In New York, the United Nations Security Council imposed sanctions on IS members.

In another development, the United States’ military said two of its drones had attacked and destroyed two vehicles identified as belonging to IS near Sinjar on Friday morning, after receiving reports from Kurdish forces that the militants were attacking civilians in the village of Kawju.

Kurdish officials confirmed the attack on Kocho after it was reported by Yazidi activists based in Washington.

“They arrived in vehicles and they started their killing this afternoon,” senior Kurdish official, Hoshiyar Zebari told Reuters news agency on Friday.

The killings took place over the space of an hour, said a Yazidi MP, Mahama Khalil, who reportedly spoke to survivors.

A resident of a nearby village said an IS fighter from the same area had given him details of the bloodshed.