ishtartv.com - aljazeera.com
Claire
Thomas, 23 Jan 2017
The
Batlos family fled Qaraqosh more than two years ago, when ISIL fighters
captured the city. They recently returned home for the first time, only to
discover their town in ruins.
As
the battle rages to retake Mosul, the last Iraqi stronghold of the Islamic
State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) group, members of
Iraq's Christian minority have started returning to the recently liberated town
of Qaraqosh.
The
Batlos family, who are Assyrian Catholics, fled Qaraqosh on August 6,
2014, after Kurdish forces warned them that ISIL would soon seize the city.
Leaving all of their belongings behind, the family travelled to nearby Erbil,
the capital of Iraq's Kurdish region.
In
December 2016, less than two months after Iraqi forces retook Qaraqosh from
ISIL, the Batlos family returned home to discover large areas of the town in
ruins, with no power or water supply. The threat of hidden improvised explosive
devices planted by ISIL fighters continues to loom large.
"We
are still scared here," Haitham Zeia Batlos told Al Jazeera.
Photos
by Claire Thomas / Al Jazeera
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