Radio Salam opened its station on FM 94.3 in Erbil province and on the web in April 2015, when the Ninevah Plains and province, an area inhabited for centuries by a religiously and ethnically diverse population (Assyrian, Chaldean, Sunnis, Yazidis, Turkmens and others), was occupied by IS.
"Yazidi women were particularly targeted by IS fighters," Ronza continued, "so we included a big report on Nadia Mourad, the Yazidi woman who managed to escape from IS brutality and was later awarded [the Vaclav Havel] Human Rights Prize in Europe for her campaigning."
When Ronza spoke about more recent times, her face became less dark: "We rebuilt the first temple in Bashiqa in April 2017. This also coincided with the Yazidi New Year Feast, where every temple has a special day and all families built their temples," she explained to Al-Monitor.
Yazidism was persecuted as a heretical thought and belief until recent times; academic and journalist Saad Salloum has defined the persecution as genocide more than a targeted religion-based attack.
The four Iraqi members at Radio Salam work in five different languages. Two members, Rayyan and Fabian, are Christians from Zakho and Baghdad; Samir is a Muslim Kurd and Ronza is the only woman and Yazidi.
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