Speaker Dr. Rewaz Faiq meets with families of Kurdistan Region citizens drowned and missing in Aegean Sea

Kurdistan Parliament Speaker Dr. Rewaz Faiq on 4 January 2022 met with the families of Kurdistan Region citizens who drowned or went missing in the Aegean Sea in late December, while attempting to migrate to Europe.

MPs Luqman Wardi (PUK), Shamul Ashti and Rupak Ahmed Rahman (KJG) were also at the meeting.

Speaker Faiq conveyed her deepest condolences to the families for their profound loss. She said, "Migration is a global phenomenon and cannot be prevented. Unfortunately, because of the unstable political and economic situation in Iraq and Kurdistan, for years people have migrated to reach the refuge of more stable and peaceful areas. Migration takes place from most countries, increasing and decreasing with the political and economic conditions. Governments and international humanitarian organizations must search for the bodies of the missing victims of these disasters, and the survivors’ physical and emotional health must be treated with great care after the shock of their ordeal and of losing their loved ones.”

The victims’ families gave Speaker Faiq information on the dead and missing and asked that the Kurdistan Parliament ask for a search for the missing, for the repatriation of the victims’ bodies, and to trace others who have gone missing and whose fate is unknown.

Dr. Faiq pledged that she will task Parliament’s relevant committees with conducting a thorough investigation, and said that she herself has contacted the relevant parties and authorities and the foreign consulates inKurdistan Region about the victims and survivors of these tragedies.