Kurdistan: Blood and Oil

May 11, 2015 | Pulitzer Center

Sebastian Meyer

Azdar, 16, steps out of the utility cabin to check on the machinery at the refinery. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Jamal, 17, smells petrol coming out of a container to test it for its water content. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Ghazal hangs up the family laundry while holding her grandson Mazal. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Sardesht, 13, Ezidiar, 9, and Jamal, 17, play in polluted water near the banks of the Tanjero river. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Zaidoon, 20, poses in front of an oil refinery with a piece of tension workout equipment. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

A photo album of wedding pictures of Zaidoon and his wife Hayam. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Ezidiar watches his brother Zaidoon check the valves on the machinery at the refinery. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Ghazal sweeps outside the shipping container where she lives while Sardesht looks into the cabin where his brothers and cousin sleep. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Saïd lights a cigarette while Ezidiar looks at Serdesht's phone and Ghazal watches television. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Jamal smokes flavored tobacco from a small hookah pipe inside the utility cabin. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Serbest, 22, adjusts the electric fuel pump at night. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Chickens roost inside a fuse box at an oil refinery. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Ezidiar, Serdesht and Saïd sleep on the floor of the shipping container the family calls home. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Jamal, 17, walks through steam at the refinery. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Jamal (17) and Azdar (16) watch as fuel oil is pumped into a storage drum at dawn. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Serbest (22) stands in oil as he sets the electric pump to fill a waiter tanker. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Jamal (17) jumps between large storage drums at the refinery. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Ghazal picks green leaves for cooking. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Hayam (l), Ghazal (c), and Said (c) watch television in the shipping container they call home. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Steam from the cooling bank rises above the refinery. Image by Sebastian Meyer. Iraq, 2015.

Last August Zaidoon and his family fled from their home on the outskirts of the city of Sinjar when ISIS militants launched their genocidal campaign against the Yazidi population. Along with thousands of their fellow Yaezidis, the family escaped from the jihadists by climbing Mt. Sinjar which lies to the north of the city.

They ran for eight days through the blistering summer heat and until they reached the security of the Kurdish Region of Iraq. There they found work and refuge in an oil refinery on the outskirts of the city of Sulaimaniyah. Today the family live in a shipping container a few dozen yards away from the refinery where the young men of the family work with no safety equipment.

Zaidoon is planning to smuggle his family into Germany, but as he waits to save enough money to pay the smugglers, the family continues to live in deplorable conditions exposed twenty-four hours a day to dangerous chemical pollutants.