‘I come to the cemetery every day – it feels like I’m with them’

Chemical warfare deeply traumatised the rural communities of Kurdistan and the distress it caused still affects survivors. TAHA MOHAMMED AMIN describes how a bomb exploded outside his house in Sewsenan village and people began to die, a nightmare vision he relives every night in his dreams.

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‘Do you know what it’s like to lose a child? I can’t forget’

The death toll in Goptapa from chemical weapons was only exceeded by that of Halabja, which had been gassed seven weeks earlier. A witness to the Goptapa attack was MIRIAM YASEEN MOHAMMED who watched neighbours and relatives run for their lives and drop dead in village alleyways.

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‘Everyone who knew me shut their door in my face’

In the Garmiyan region of Iraq more women and children died in Saddam's Third Anfal than in any other Anfal campaign. FARS AZIZ AHMED survived the attack and describes how he saved his family from certain death.

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‘No one heard me jump from the lorry because of all the screaming’

Kurdish villagers risked their lives to escape the Iraqis. TOOBA HAMID RASUL describes how she leapt from a moving army vehicle with her baby tied to her back.

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‘“You betrayed your nation,” I told Saddam Hussein at his trial’

During Saddam's trial in Baghdad, Kurdish Anfal survivors confronted the former Iraqi leader. One of them was MAHMOUD RASUL MUSTAFA, who last saw his wife, three sons and two daughters in a prison camp near Kirkuk.

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‘The Iraqis even killed horses – I’ve never seen such a sadistic military force’

When the Iraqi army blitzed Kurdish peshmerga bases with poison gas in February 1988, AZAD SAGERMA, a senior field commander with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), was unaware his forces would face a military catastrophe that could only end in defeat.

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‘Chemical weapons put fear in the hearts of most people’

The Iraqi army was merciless in pursuing peshmerga fighters with poison gas. Fearing further chemical attacks, OMAR FATAH HUSSEIN, a senior leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), ordered his peshmerga to retreat west through a desolate landscape of abandoned villages.

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‘The Iraqis tried to break the Kurdish spirit with chemical weapons’

After their attack on Halabja, the Iraqis extended their poison gas attacks to villages closer to Sulaimaniya. With casualties rising after exposure to mustard and nerve gas, DOCTOR FAIQ MOHAMMED GULPI established a secret mountain hospital to treat the wounded.

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