Adnan’s dream is that he will be able to liberate the holy pilgrim sites at the end of this trip. He is now waging a battle in the mountains at Sinjar. He had worked in the town council at Sinjar and was one of the last to leave the city when it was taken by the Islamic State. That is where Adnan’s brother, cousin and his father, Kassim Schesho, are fighting. The destination of this journey is the temple at Sherfadeen, the second most important holy place of the Yazidis, the grave of a Yazidi resistance fighter who fought against the Mongols in the 13th century. “It is already decided,” says Adnan and he becomes quiet because he does not know the date written on his forehead. It is the belief of the Yazidis, his people. One of them crashes and two were shot down by IS militias.Īdnan says that what will happen on the day of his death is already written on his forehead in invisible letters. But there is a lack of food, clothing and medicines. The Iraqi army has an air passage to help people in the most urgent need. Tens of thousands of Yazidis escaped at that time 80,000 went over the mountains in a northerly direction whilst 10,000 remained because they could not go on or because they believed they were safe on the mountain. The IS fighters surrounded the mountain and also the 10,000 Yazidis who had escaped in August when IS took the south side of the mountain and Sinjar. But for the moment there is, as has been the case for months, only one way to this mountain in Sinjar, i.e. It will create a corridor through the area under siege. It is early December and an offensive against the Islamic State is going to begin in two weeks. Everything is lying in a big heap next to his bed and Adnan hopes that he will be able to get it all in the helicopter, including his trolley bag which makes him look a bit like someone on vacation who has become lost on the way to a holiday club. He bought German painkillers and Russian night-vision glasses, cigarettes for the troops and warm trousers for his father. It is because people respond so slowly that he made the decision to go to the mountain himself. “If people respond so slowly we will soon be wiped out,” he says. It also says that the conflict can only be resolved on the political level and long term. It says that his dismay about the situation in Iraq is very understandable. It says: “Please excuse to delay which has been caused by the high volume of enquiries”. One of them that he has been waiting for is from the CDU. When the electricity comes back on and the lights flicker he downloads his messages and e-mails. It is supposed to start the day after tomorrow when the wind is not too strong and the fog is not too thick for the helicopters. He has only ever been to Iraq once and that was to visit relatives. He’s only been in an aeroplane twice in his life. He is wondering whether he will survive this trip. He is hoping to meet his father, the Lion of Sinjar. Now he is lying on a bed in Dahuk in a town in northern Iraq in the Kurdish area which has become the front in the war against the “Islamic State” (IS).
He drank beer in the spa Gardens there and played football on the lawn, and he stood in the assembly hall wearing a black jacket and received a certificate. Adnan is small person, 24 years old, Yazidi, German he has a big nose and nice brown eyes. In a dark room two nights before going to war a boy from Lower Saxony talks about the day of his death.
“Als iedereen zo traag reageert zijn we binnenkort allemaal uitgeroeid.” De 24-jarige yezidi-vluchteling kan de ellende van zijn stamgenoten niet meer aanzien vanuit Duitsland en besluit mee te gaan vechten tegen islamisten, ook al is hij een compleet ingeburgerde Duitser die Irak nauwelijks kent. Vandaag deel 1: ‘De Leeuwen van Sinjar’, waarin Spiegel-journalist Jonathan Stock de jonge Irakees Adnan volgt naar Sinjar, in 2014 belegerd door IS-strijders.
In de aanloop naar die uitreiking presenteert NRC een selectie van de andere genomineerde artikelen in het Duits, Zweeds en Portugees - voor de gelegenheid vertaald in het Engels. Wie wint de European Press Prize? Op 14 april worden deze prijzen voor Europese kwaliteitsjournalistiek uitgereikt in Praag, NRC is twee keer genomineerd.