(CNN) Secretary of State John Kerry said Thursday that the United States has determined that ISIS' action against the Yazidis and other minority groups in Iraq and Syria constitutes genocide. "My purpose here today is to assert in my judgment, (ISIS) is responsible for genocide against groups in areas under its control including Yazidis, Christians and Shiite Muslims," he said, during a news conference at the State Department. Kerry said that in 2014, ISIS trapped Yazidis, killed them, enslaved thousands of Yazidi women and girls, "selling them at auction, raping them at will and destroying the communities in which they had lived for countless generations," executed Christians "solely for their faith" and also "forced Christian women and girls into slavery."Kerry said that in 2014, ISIS trapped Yazidis, killed them and enslaved thousands of Yazidi women and girlsThis is the first time that the United States has declared a genocide since Darfur in 2004
"ISIL's campaign of terror against the innocent, including the Yazidi and _ minorities, and its grotesque targeted acts of violence, show all the warning signs of genocide," Kerry said in August 2014.