Nemam Ghafouri, doctor who aided Yazidis in Iraq, dies at 52
By Jane Arraf New York Times,Updated April 9, 2021, 2 hours ago
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Dr. Nemam Ghafouri (in red) with Yazidi elders at a temple in northern Iraq in 2019.JANE ARRAF/NYT
That Nemam Ghafouri was born in a cave might be one of the least remarkable things about her. It was the 1960s, and her mother went into labor in the mountains of what is now the Kurdistan region of Iraq as she was fleeing with her other children from Iraqi government forces.
Like tens of thousands of other victims of Saddam Husseinâs campaign against the Kurds, the family sought refuge in Iran before moving to Sweden as refugees. Ms. Ghafouri went on to study medicine in Sweden and in Hungary and become a cardiothoracic surgeon. She participated in aid missions in India and Ethiopia. Then she returned to Iraq to help Syrian refugees flooding across the border to the Kurdistan region.
Nemam Ghafouri, Doctor Who Aided Yazidis in Iraq, Dies at 52
Dr. Ghafouri helped survivors of an ISIS genocide and reunited formerly enslaved women with children taken from them. She died of Covid-19.
Dr. Nemam Ghafouri in 2019 at a clinic that her aid organization established in a camp for displaced Yazidis in the Kurdistan region of Iraq.Credit.Jane Arraf
April 7, 2021Updated 1:46 p.m. ET
That Nemam Ghafouri was born in a cave might be one of the least remarkable things about her. It was the 1960s, and her mother went into labor in the mountains of what is now the Kurdistan region of Iraq as she was fleeing with her other children from Iraqi government forces.