'We were all prisoners; now, we are free': Meet Iraqis fleeing ISIS in Mosul
*Warning: Some content in this documentary may be disturbing.*
It takes less than an hour to drive the stretch of highway between the cities of Erbil and Mosul in Iraq — equivalent to the distance between Moose Jaw to Regina.
Mosul is a city still under siege as Iraqi security forces fight to regain control. CBC producer Sarah Lawrynuik recently travelled to Iraq, on her own time, to see for herself how people there are coping.
The first stop along the road to Mosul: Al Khazer camp. It's a camp where people who have been displaced by the violence in Mosul are headed. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, at this camp alone, nearly 29,000 people call it home.
Two years I have cried for my brothers. I don't even have their bodies.- Talal Jarbo Sliman
Talal Jarbo Sliman was one of the first to arrive from the city of Mosul. He had been at the camp less than 24 hours.
"ISIS captured my three brothers and they killed them. It was a massacre, and afterwards they wouldn't even give us their bodies for a proper burial," Talal tells Sarah in her documentary, 70 k to Mosul.
ISIS also killed four of Talal's nephews. Their crime was aiding the Peshmerga and Iraqi security forces to help the Yazidis escape ISIS back in 2014.
"Two years I have cried for my brothers. I don't even have their bodies." he says.
"We were all prisoners; now, we are free."
About 20 km from camp, Sarah arrives in the Assyrian Christian city of Qaraqosh. In 2014, tens of thousands of people fled in mere hours before ISIS came in. Now the city is deserted.
"The city is destroyed. And honestly destroyed is probably an understatement," Sarah says.
"Every single house and business is torched. Rubble and downed power lines are everywhere in the streets. But it's the churches that bear the brunt of the damage."
Qaraqosh has been taken back by the army. But there is an expansive network of tunnels ISIS built underneath the city that's keeping the soldiers on edge.
When Sarah arrives in Mosul, she is told to keep her head down, duck to avoid snipers.
"While so many of the cities we visited have been completely deserted. Mosul is different," she explains.
"There are many families here who haven't left. Instead they put a white flag at their door. As if it's a plea for mercy."
Hizm Younis, 59, was born in Mosul and he's never left.
"We were here when ISIS came and we could do nothing. It was our fate. It is our life. We couldn't say anything."
Hizm has a 23-year-old son at home who's paralyzed and bedridden. He says the last two years under ISIS rule have been trying in every way.
"We are all Muslims. We are all brothers. But it was very difficult. I am an employee at an oil distribution company. It's been two years and five months since I received a salary."
Listen the full documentary just under the video at the top of this web post.
The documentary 70 K To Mosul was produced by Sarah Lawrynuik and The Current's documentary editor, Joan Webber.
Thanks to the following actors:
Patrick Sabongui - the voice in translation of Hizm Younis.
Lee Majdoub spoke the words of Talal Jarbo Sliman.
Amad Sharmrou voiced the words of Salem Ahmed.
Mark Ghanime spoke the words of Captain Mubarak Behnam.