Thread by @KRG_USA

Today is #HalabjaMemorialDay, marking the 32nd year since the chemical weapons massacre in #Halabja in @Kurdistan. This genocidal attack alone killed an estimated 5,000 civilians in a matter of hours.

Here is one survivor’s account: bit.ly/3b5qAkp

Even today, the effects of the attack reverberate through the #Halabja community. People who were exposed to the chemicals continue to experience health problems, children are born with congenital deformities, and families remain shattered.

bit.ly/38TB4Sb

The city of #Halabja was not the only location targeted on that day. Similar, brutal attacks were conducted by Iraqi aircraft on surrounding villages.

Watch the accounts of Obed and Siamand, who survived such attacks but lost nearly everything: bit.ly/2wdkoI1

The #Halabja attack was a singular event that has come to symbolize the genocides that Saddam Hussein carried out against @Kurdistan. In the years prior to Halabja, Iraqi forces carried out the Anfal Campaign, a systematic campaign to crush the identity of the Kurdish people.

In the Anfal Campaign alone, an est 182,000 people were killed and more than one million fled as refugees. 4,000 villages were destroyed as the Ba’athists aimed to break the backbone of Kurdish livelihoods and culture.

Listen to one survivor’s story - bit.ly/2waMW52

On July 31, 1983, the Iraqi regime arrested an estimated 8,000 members of the Barzani tribe. They are believed to have been executed and buried in the deserts of southern Iraq.

Watch one man’s quest to find the final resting place of the Barzanis - bit.ly/38QyE6R

Beginning in the 1970s, Iraqi forces began deporting Faily Kurds from the disputed areas near the Iranian border and further south near Baghdad, claiming that they were Iranian citizens.

Watch one woman’s account - bit.ly/3b0Moh2

In 2014, the Yezidis and Christians of the Nineveh Plains were targeted for genocide by the ISIS terrorist group, continuing Iraq’s cycle of genocide. Thousands were killed and thousands more remain missing. Watch Yezidi children recount their experience - bit.ly/3d2JfPw

30+ years later, we continue to mark days like #HalabjaMemorialDay, because the genocides of the past still shape @Kurdistan and Iraq today. @KRG_USA published a book on the 30th anniversary of Halabja with essays and survivor stories, available here - bit.ly/2WgH44R

Remembering crimes like those committed in #Halabja is important. But so is the pursuit of justice for the victims. Only through justice can the process of reconciliation begin and the cycle of genocide be broken.

(Many thanks to the Kurdistan Memory Programme for providing some of the video content in this thread. You can see some of their amazing work collecting accounts of @Kurdistan’s history at kurdistanmemoryprogramme.com)