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Kirkuk residents demand truth about fate of their missing

The families of people who have gone missing from Kirkuk and other disputed areas in Iraq over the past decade hope that the federal government retaking these areas will lead to more information on their fate.
Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga fighters pose for a photo next to a military vehicle bearing the Kurdish flag after they reportedly captured several villages from Islamic State (IS) group jihadistst in the district of Daquq, south of the northern city of Kirkuk on September 11, 2015. An Iraqi officer said that the operation was launched in the morning with support from international coalition aircraft, and has succeeded in retaking ten villages from IS. AFP PHOTO / MARWAN IBRAHIM        (Photo credit should read MA

BAGHDAD — Now that Iraq's central government in Baghdad has retaken control of Kirkuk and other disputed areas that had been administered by the Erbil-based Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), citizens of those regions are demanding to know the fate of relatives who have disappeared or been detained during the past 14 years.

Dozens of Kirkuk residents demonstrated Nov. 7 to demand information on the fate of their kin allegedly held by Kurdish security forces. Their demands were echoed by Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, who on the same day called for an investigation into how these people disappeared.

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