After a horrific gas attack on Balisan valley, survivors were imprisoned in Erbil without medical treatment. MOHAMMED RASUL QADIR, who was held in the same jail, saw 57 villagers from Balisan die within a week of their arrival.
Villagers from Sheikh Wasan initially refused to believe chemical weapons had been used against them. AISHA TAHA ABDULLAH remembers her son laughing when she urged him to cover his windows and doors with blankets.
Blinded by mustard gas, a young Kurdish boy is separated from his father by Iraqi secret policemen. ABDULLAH MOHAMMED ABDULLAH describes the last time he saw his dad.
The gassing of Goptapa village on the banks of the Lesser Zab river was the most deadly chemical attack after Halabja. AISHA ISMAEL ALI remains deeply disturbed by the loss of five of her six children in the attack.
There were very few trained medics able to treat gas victims after the Balisan valley attacks in 1987. DOCTOR ZYRIAN ABDUL YOUNIS was the only peshmerga doctor in a region stretching from Erbil to Iran.
The villagers of Ware thought they'd be safe from Iraqi gas attacks because they lived near a government base. They were wrong. AISHA MAGHDID MAHMOUD recalls how her father searched for their family members amidst the corpses of their neighbours.
Villagers from the Balisan valley compare the Iraqi poison gas attacks against them to “doomsday". AISHA TAHA MUSTAFA says she was frightened to the depths of her soul when people started dying around her.
The long term effects of poison gas are still being felt in Kurdistan. DOCTOR SAREN AZER, a Kurdish medic who trained in Canada, returned home to treat Kurds who still suffer from from the effects of chemical attacks decades later.
The poison gas attack on the Balisan valley was a first for Saddam Hussein. Never before had chemical weapons been used by a state against its own people. NAJIBA KHADIR AHMED has vivid and painful memories of what happened.
