Member News
17th January 2013An international conference will be held in London today on the genocide of the Kurdish people carried out in Iraq under Saddam Hussein.
The genocide began in the 1960s and continued until the late 1980s.
An estimated 180,000 Kurdish people were killed between 1987 and 1988 alone during Saddam Hussein's genocidal campaign called Anfal. The true scale of the killing is not yet known and mass graves continue to be uncovered.
The conference will mark the 10th anniversary of the international intervention in Iraq which ended Saddam's brutal regime and the 25th anniversary of the Anfal genocide operation, and the chemical attack on Halabja, during which 180,000 Kurdish men, women and children were brutally murdered.
Ahead of the conference, the Kurdistan Regional Government's Foreign Minister, Falah Mustafa, has called on the international community to recognize the genocide which took place in Iraq and not allow the same fate to befall others.
Mr Mustafa will speak at the conference in London, alongside genocide experts, humanitarians, parliamentarians and survivors of the genocide in Iraq.
Ms Bayan Sami Abdul Rahman, High Representative to the UK, Kurdistan Regional Government said:
“We said 'never again' after chemical weapons were inflicted on us, but almost exactly 25 years later, the international community fears they will be used again in Syria.
“This shows, now more than ever, why the genocide against the Kurds must be recognised internationally. Dictators must not be allowed to use these lethal, despicable weapons without international outcry, recrimination or justice.
“Saddam Hussein was never tried for his crimes of targeted mass murder and only Sweden and Norway have recognized his crimes as genocide. More than 23,000 British people have signed an e-petition urging the British Government to recognize what happened in Iraq as genocide. We hope the Government is listening.”