Anfal Campaign or the Kurdish Genocide was conducted with the Western weapons in Southern Kurdistan (north-Iraq) during the 1980s.

Ali Hassan Majid the Saddam Hussein’s cousin is known as “Chemical Ali” following the mass-killing of Kurdish civilians in the town of Halabja, in which 5,000 Kurds were gassed.

Chemical Ali issued a decree in 1987 for the chiefs of security, police, and the Iraqi military corps to kill, destroy and annihilate the Kurdish people on a draconian scale. He ordered the Iraqi army to do their utmost to destroy the Kurds with the aim of total annihilation.

The Article 5th of Chemical Ali’s decree states; “any Kurd between the age of 15 and 70 must be arrested, searched and killed”.

Anfal Campaign conducted in 8 different stages, and initiated on 25th February 1988. At the first stage 250 Kurdish forces and villagers were killed.

Thousands of civilian lost their live on their way to escape to the neighbouring countries. They died of hunger and disease.

On 16th March chemical bombardments of Halabja followed in which 5,000 civilian were killed within few hours and more than 10,000 people were injured and diseased.

The second wave of Anfal Campaign was launched on 22nd March with the chemical bombardment of SewSinan village. Over hundreds of Kurdish civilian were killed in that village.

The third wave of Anfal Campaign was launched in Germiyan in between 7th and 20th April. On 14th April, over 20,000 civilian Kurds were herded in a place known as Mile Sure, in the vicinity of Kalar city, and then they were forced to migrate toward Qoretu and were massacred on the way.

The forth wave of Anfal Campaign was executed on 3 May in which the villages of Asker and Goptepe were attacked by Chemical bombs and over hundreds of the Kurds were massacred.

The fifth wave of Anfal Campaign was carried out from 15th May until 26th August followed by the sixth and seven stages of the massacre.

Thousands of the Kurds who escaped the massacre managed to reach the Leylan and Tataq refuge camps, from where they were expelled and forced to make exodus to the southern part of Iraq, where they were disappeared.

Although Saddam was one of the most brutal tyrants of our time, but all these draconian crimes were conducted by the Western weapons and in front of the Western observes and met with silences of the Western politicians and institutions who invoke democracy and human rights for undertaking certain self-interested action and stood silent in the face Kurdish genocide.

Over 182,000 Kurds were killed during Anfal Campaign, yet it has not been recognised as genocide by the international community and the Western powers.

 

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