A delegation made up of 10 people from the Italian association Towards Kurdistan entered Iraq on the morning of 20 May.

The delegation's goals were to help build a health facility in Serdest, the village in the region of Shengal where the Yazidi population, victims of the genocide carried out by ISIS in 2014, and, from 26 May, to visit Maxmur camp, given that, for years, the association has supported the health care within the camp.

The delegation said in a statement: “On the morning of 26 May we left Khamasor, towards Mosul, as scheduled. In Mosul, three drivers and two girls from the camp came to pick us up. They were happy to see us. We headed for Maxmur, but at the last check point, 20 Km from the camp, our passports were confiscated with the order to go back and immediately go to Bagdhad airport to board the first plane to Italy. A substantial expulsion, even if not a formal one.”

The statement added: “We had informed the Italian embassy in Baghdad of our intention to arrive at Maxmur. From the foreign ministry's crisis unit, we received a phone call and a message inviting us instead to accept the diktat of the Iraqi government which had authorized us to carry out the trip. We were then ‘accompanied’ by an armored army escort to Mosul to then continue to Baghdad. We refused to go to the airport in the absence of a formal deportation order and wanted to meet the Italian embassy and, above all, the UNHCR, under whose protection is Maxmur camp.”

The delegation said that “the real problem in which the Italian Foreign Ministry and the UNHCR should intervene for Maxmur is to stop the continuous bombing from Turkey on Iraqi territory, to guarantee the people of the camp the peace, life and serenity they have the right to. The real problem is the violation of human rights.”

The delegation delivered the document to the Italian Embassy in Baghdad and will send it to UNHCR and UNICEF Iraq.