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Halabja
Bloody Friday
Chemical massacre of the Kurds by the Iraqi regime
Halabja-March 1988
Prepared by Alex
Atroushi
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Every murder destroys a measure of
human dignity |
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We were burnt as newly-grown plants, * From the poem "Khaibar" by Mohammed Reza Abdol-Malakian.
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Halabja, standing against oppression
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Joy and happiness permeated the air in Halabja. |
A Glance at the
position of the town of Halabja
City of Halabja, with a
population of about 70,000 is in the province of Sulaimanya, 260
kilometers north-east
of the city of Baghdad. It is surrounded by the heights of Suran, Balambu,
Shireh-roudi and Shaghan in the north,
south and east.The lake of the dam of Darbandikhan is to the west of this town.
Halabja which is within 1 1 kilometers
of the nearest Iranian borderline occupies a green and fertile area covered
with forest vegetation. Most of the people
of Halabja are farmers or cattle breeders. Halabja and its surrounding villages
such as Khormal and Dojeyleh have for
long witnessed the struggles of the Kurds against the Iraqi regime.
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What happened to
Halabja on the Bloody Friday?
The brutal massacre of the
oppressed and innocent people of Halabja began before the sunrise of Friday,
18th of
March 1988. The Iraqi regime committed its most tragic and horrible crime from
the beginning of the imposed war
until now against the civilian people on Friday, 18th of March. On that day,
Halabja was bombarded more than twenty
times by Iraqi regime's warplanes with chemical and cluster bombs. That Friday
afternoon, the magnitude of Iraqi crimes
became evident. In the streets and alleys of Halabja, corpses piled up over one
another. Tens of children, while playing in
front of the their houses in the morning, were martyred instantly by cyanide
gases. The innocent children did not even have
time to run back home. Some children fell down at the threshold of the door of
their houses and never rose again.
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A mother who embraced her
one-year-old baby, fell down two steps from her house and was martyred. In a
150 meter area in
the main street of Halabja, at least fifty women and children were martyred as
a result of the deployment of the chemical weapons.
A father was sitting over the bodies of his wife and ten of his children in one
of the alleys of Halabja and was wailing. The sound of
his wailing touched any cruel human being. The crimes were huge, very huge.
In a Simorgh Van, the
corpses of 20 women and children who had been prepared to leave the town and
the chemical bombardment
of the town had deprived them of this opportunity, made any observer stop and
ponder about the depth of the catastrophe. Fatal wounds
on the corpses of these innocent people were evident.
The doors of most houses
were left open and inside of each house, there were some martyred and
wounded people.
The enemy had heightened the cruelty and heart-handedness to its peak and took
no pity on its own people.
Saddam's crime in the chemical bombardment of Halabja has indeed been
unprecedented in the history of
the imposed war. Saddam's crime in Halabja can never be compared to the tragedy
of the chemical bombardment of Sardasht.
In Halabja more than five thousand people were martyred and over seven thousand
more people were wounded.
Women and children formed 75 percent of the martyrs and wounded of the bloody
Friday of Halabja.
Along with Halabja,
Khormal, Dojaileh and their surrounding villages were also chemically bombarded
frequently
but the center of the catastrophe was Halabja.
Nadriyeh Mohammed Fattah, a 15 year-old girl
who
studied in the technical high school of Halabja
The Repetition of a Crime
which Has Been Condemned Several Times
The Iraqi regime signed the
1925 protocol of Geneva of the prohibition of the deployment of the chemical
and biological
weapons in wars in 1931. The regulations of the 1972 Convention of Geneva
requesting all countries to cease production,
completion and conservation of all kinds of chemical and biological weapons and
to demolish them and the UN 37/98 resolution
emphasizing the necessity of observing the articles and contents of the 1925
protocol and the 1972 Convention of Geneva have
also been accepted by the UN member countries including Iraq.
In late April 1987, twenty
four villages of Iraq's Kurdistan were targeted by the chemical bombardment
These villages were
chemically bombarded twice in less than 48 hours. Saber Ahmad Khoshnam, one of
the inhabitants of the bombarded villages
in Loqmanodulleh Hospital in Tehran on 28th of April 1987, told reporters that
the Iraqi warplanes dropped 18 chemical bombs
at Sheikh Dassan, Kani Bard, Pasian and Tuteman villages. He said that more
than one hundred people of these villages were
wounded and that he had witnessed that an entire family in Parsian village lost
their sight. In the course of the chemical
bombardment of the late April 1987 of the Iraqi villages, more than 130
innocent villagers were martyred and about five hundred
of them were wounded.
The Iraqi regime has
deployed chemical weapons against its own people while the UN general
secretary's representatives
during their visits to Iran in two occasions, prepared detailed reports from
the deployment of the chemical weapons against
the civilian people and submitted them to the United Nations in reports number
S/1 6433 and S/18852 and after the submission
of these reports by the general secretary to the Security Council, eventually
this council, too, joined those individuals and
organizations who condemned Iraq's deployment of chemical weapons. But despite
all these condemnations, Baghdad's
rulers have continued their crimes.
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Every life has a measure of sorrow, and sometimes this is what awakens us. |
The Gases Deployed against the
People of Halabja
The Iraqi regime, in the
chemical bombardment of Halabja and the surrounding towns and villages, has
deployed
three kinds of chemical gases. According to the findings of Iranian physicians,
the mustard, nerve and cyanide gases
have been used against civilians in Halabja and its surroundings. A group of
the martyrs of the chemical bombarderat
of Halabja, after inhaling the cyanide gas, were suffocated immediately.
Post-mortem examination of the bodies of
the chemical bombarderat of Halabja, has proved that the suffocation of the
most of the martyrs has been due to the inhalation of cyanide gas.
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Mass media and Iraq's
crimes in Halabja
The Iraqi regime's crimes
in chemically bombing the Halabja town were too grave for any humanbeing to
overbook.
Correspondents of the western and American mass media who have visited Halabja,
found out some facts about
the horrible crimes committed by the Iraqi regime.
Also, the radio and
televisions network in the United States, France, and Britain, by broadcasting
a short film of
the chemical massacre of the Halabja residents, made their audiences familiar
with the most horrible crimes in
the history after the atomic bombardment of Hiroshima and Nakazaki Some of the
materials reelected by
the world press concerning the chemical bombardment of Halabja are as follows:
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Article by the
correspondent of the London Daily., the independent, published on 23rd of
March, 1988:
" ... The reported slaughter of 5,000 Kurds in Iraqi poison
gas attacks underlines a dangerous new dimension
in the volatile middle east: the growth of the chemical warfare capability of
several important regional powers, and
the fear that, despite efforts to curb these weapons, they could be used
more widely.
".. (in producing chemical weapons)
Iraq has apparently been helped by British, west German, Indian, Austrian,
Belgian,
and Italian companies, despite bans on the sale of chemical that could have
military use...
"... There is evidence
that the Iraqis did drop poison gas bombs on the towns because the
traditionally rebellious Kurds,
who have been fighting for autonomy from Baghdad for years, welcomed the
Iranian (troops)."
French Television m 23rd,
and 24th of March, 1988
Different French Television
networks, on Thursday and Wednesday on 23rd and 24th of March 1988, the first
pictures of corpses
of thousands of those martyred and wounded of the chemical bombing in Halabja
were broadcast.
The commentators of the
French Television, described these crimes as intolerable, disgusting and horrible.
Some commentators
considered the crimes of Saddam as even more horrible than some of Hitter's
crimes.
The first channel of the
French Television noted that it is not the first time that the Baghdad regime
had deployed chemical weapons,
however this is the first time that Iraq, is so vastly deploying them against
the civilians.
Andrew Gowers, middle east
editor, and Richard Johns of the London Daily, Financial Times, writing on 23rd
of March, 1988:
"... What has been
happening in the last year, especially the last week, in a remote corner
of north-east Iraq reveals unplumbed
depths of savagery...
Alistair Hay, pathology
professor at Leeds university, England, speaking on BBC Television News, and
BBC Radio
World Service oh 22nd and 23rd of March, 1988:
" The Kurds have
claimed for a number of months, perhaps over a year, that Iraq has been using
chemical agents against them.
But this latest occasion seems to be the first really documented case that we
have where chemical agents have been used.
"Iraq has used
chemical agents against Iran on a very large scale for three years now. And
although the west and other
countries have been condemnatory about that use, the country (Iraq) still felt
secure enough to use chemical agents.
They have used them because these agents are very effective against and
opposition that has no protection and until
such time as there is perhaps an end to war war, or suff icient sanctions
against Iraq to persuade it not to use chemical
agents, I'm afraid they will continue to use them or so it seems."
"The United Nations
have had three investigations into the use of chemical warfare agnets in the
Iraq-Iran war and
they have said unequivocally on all three occasions that Iraq has used chemical
warfare agents. They have said that
mustard gas was certainly used on all three occasions, that is in 1984, 1986
anti 1987. and they have also said that
they have evidenced that a nerve agent, tabun, was also used. The investigation
was carried by a well qualified team, so
l have no doubt in my mind that they have been used."
Article from Halabja by
David Hirt, Middle East correspondent of London Daily, the Guardian, published
on March 23, 1988:
" No wounds, no blood,
no traces of explosions can be found on the bodies - scores of men, women and
children,
livestock and pet animals - that litter the flat-topped dwellings and crude
earthen streets in this remote and neglected
Kurdish town...
" The skin of the
bodies is strangely discolored, with their eyes open and staring where they
have not disappeared into
their sockts, a grayish slime oozing from their mouths and their fingers still
grotesquely twisted.
" Death seemingly
caught them almost unawares in the midst of their household chores. They had
just the strength, some
of them, to make it to the doorways of their homes, only to collapse there a
few feet beyond. Here a mother seems to
clasp her children in a last embrace, there an old man shields an infant from
he cannot have known what...
"It is hard to
conceive of any explanation for the chemical bombardment of Halabja other than
the one which
Iranians and Kurds offer - revenge...
"As artillery
continues to rumble round the hills, Halabja stands silent and deserted except
for what they can
find and a dazed old man, absent during the bombing, who has come back in
search of his family..."
On the borders of Kurdistan
On the borders
Where throats are
Choked with good-byes
And eagerness is
Suspended in the eyes
And people asked
When.. where are we ? why..?!Here a child dies..
There a baby lies, and
Another face-down cries:
My wound is hurting
My breath is hurting
My stomach is hurting,
Mother: Am I to die ?
And my white pigeon ?!
Are we going to die ?In tears she said:
There beyond the border posts..
Only days: we won't die
For us, God will try..Again, the child cries:
Will my pigeon die ?
Mother: I love her..
She is my life
Because I love,
She does not deserve to die
I love her...All broke in tears
Dear.. your pigeon died
When the planes priedAnd she broke in tears
My white pigeon was gassed ?!
My Kurdish pigeon died
Mother.. my hair is falling
why ? Am I do die ?
Some water please..
W-a-t-e-r .../////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
Reference Material on Halabja:
Halabja: Symbol of Hussein's Inhumanity
Why I Went, What I Saw, by Christine Gosden, Liverpool University
Great Terror, by Jeffery Goldberg, The New Yorker, March 2002
Anfal Campaign by KRG
Testimony of Dr Christine Gosden, 1998 Congressional Hearings
Anfal Campaign Maps
Experiment in evil
Lessons from Halabja
Still Suffering From '88 Gas Attack
More info and pictures
Please visit
Read more
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Poisonous
Weapons By Gwynne Roberts, in CRIMES OF WAR, 1999 |
Why I Went, What I Saw
by Christine Gosden,
The Washington Post, Wednesday 11 March 1998
Quand
«notre » ami Saddam gazait ses Kurdes Kendal Nezan, in Le Monde
Diplomatique, Mars 1998
Genocide in
www.hrw.org/reports/1993/iraqanfal
Gendercide Watch: The Anfal Campaign (Iraqi
www.gendercide.org/case_anfal.html
www.geocities.com/iraqisitesguide/docs/doc13.htm
www.geocities.com/iraqisitesguide/docs/doc62.htm
www.geocities.com/iraqisitesguide/docs/doc38.htm
www.geocities.com/iraqisitesguide/docs/doc39.htm
www.geocities.com/iraqisitesguide/docs/doc61.htm
www.geocities.com/iraqisitesguide/docs/doc60.htm
Please send us e- if you have any comments or suggestion
Kurdistan Democratic Party-KDP
Revised: 30-11-2005, By Alex Atroushi
