Iraq’s Al-Sudani on Al-Samawah mass grave: Painful memories of bloodshed upon racist regime
Shafaq News/ On Monday, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani remarked that the discovery of a mass grave of Kurds in the Al-Samawah desert,south of Baghdad, recalls the “suffering” endured by the Iraqi people under the Ba'ath regime.
On Sunday, a mass grave was discovered in the Al-Samawah desert, dating back to the 1980s, containing the remains of Kurdish women and children who were victims of the Anfal campaign.
“Although many years have passed since the fall of the Ba’ath regime and its tyranny over the Iraqi people, new evidence of its heinous crimes continues to surface, bearing witness to the horrific atrocities our nation endured under dictatorship,” Al-Sudani wrote on X.
The PM further confirmed that the recent discovery of this mass grave “revives painful memories of the bloodshed, suffering, struggle, and enforced disappearances inflicted upon our people by the brutal, racist regime.”
Notably, the Anfal campaign, which began in 1986 and intensified in 1988 before continuing until 1989, was led by Ali Hassan al-Majid, infamously known as "Chemical Ali," who was the Secretary General of the Ba'ath Party's Northern Bureau and served as the region's military governor, while the military operations were commanded by former Iraqi Defense Minister Sultan Hashim.
On May 3, 2011, the Iraqi High Criminal Court classified the Anfal campaign as a "crime against humanity and genocide" and convicted al-Majid, who was also responsible for a chemical attack on Halabja. Al-Majid was sentenced to death, and the execution took place on January 25, 2010.
