ع
Experts working for the UN Human Rights Council reported in April that Yanar Mohammed, a leading women’s rights advocate, had received death threats and online abuse for years before armed men killed her outside her Baghdad home in March. The perpetrators have not been identified, though the experts attributed the threats to extremist religious militia. Mohammed co-founded an organisation that set up some of the few shelters available to abused women in a country where many survivors lack independent income or safe places to go, according to a BBC News investigation published on October 13.
A UN committee on discrimination against women described violence against women and girls in Iraq as widespread and under-reported in a May assessment that called for stronger legislation. The committee urged authorities to repeal provisions that exonerate rapists who marry their victims and allow reduced sentences for so-called honour killings. Human Rights Watch’s World Report 2026 noted that parliament failed in 2025 to pass a long-delayed anti-domestic violence law, leaving patriarchal norms embedded in the penal code that enable impunity for male violence against women and girls.
Sarah Jassim told BBC News that she uses video recordings to document harassment and evidence of abuse, declaring her camera her primary tool in the fight. The activist’s work reflects the risks faced by those challenging social stigma and inadequate protection for survivors. Hanaa Edwar, another women’s rights figure, has similarly highlighted the isolation that accompanies such advocacy, according to the same BBC News report.
Iraqi police received around 300 reports of sexual violence since the start of the year, an activist named Miri told BBC News, though both she and UN experts stressed the absence of reliable nationwide statistics. The UN Secretary-General’s report on conflict-related sexual violence documented a global surge to nearly 10,000 verified cases in 2025, more than double the previous year, with women and girls comprising 92 percent of victims across 21 affected countries including Iraq. Under Iraq’s Law on Support to Female Yazidi Survivors, authorities approved 2,587 compensation applications, 1,341 of them for Yazidi, Turkmen, Shabak and Christian survivors of sexual violence, according to the same UN assessment.
The legacy of Islamic State atrocities continues to shape the environment for activists, with the UN Office of the Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict maintaining a dedicated Iraq profile that includes supplements to investigation protocols. Human Rights Watch reported that survivors of gender-based violence still encounter limited access to justice or shelter, exacerbating the isolation described by defenders who press for systemic change. Threats against frontline workers have increased across conflict settings, a pattern the UN Secretary-General’s 2025 report linked to curtailed humanitarian access and attacks on service providers.
Iraqi authorities have yet to implement many of the UN committee’s recommendations from May, leaving activists such as those connected to the shelters established by Mohammed’s organisation operating with minimal state backing. The combination of legal gaps and security risks has prompted some defenders to document abuses anonymously while continuing public campaigns, according to accounts gathered by BBC News and cross-referenced with Human Rights Watch findings.
