On September 1, 2014, the UN Human Rights Council (the Council) held a “Special Session on the human rights situation in Iraq in light of abuses committed by the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant and associated groups” after receiving a request for a special session from the Permanent Representative of Iraq to the Council.  According to a press release, the Council also adopted a resolution requesting that the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights “urgently dispatch a mission to Iraq to investigate alleged violations and abuses of international human rights law” by these groups.  In the resolution, the Council condemned “systematic violations and abuses of human rights and violations of international humanitarian law” and stressed that “[t]hose responsible for such violations of international humanitarian law or violations and abuses of human rights law must be held to account.”