Observances were held yesterday at the United Nations and in Iraq for the victims of the Hussein regime's 1988 chemical attack on the Kurdish village of Halabja, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, March 17, 2008).
Roughly 5,600 Iraqis, most of them Kurds, died following exposure to nerve and mustard agents on March 16 and 17, 1988. A significant number of survivors continue to experience health problems.
The attack was part of a campaign that would kill tens of thousands of Kurds, a population Hussein suspected of supporting Iran in its war with Iraq.
"Today, more than 20 years later, we remember the innocent victims of Halabja chemical attacks with the hope that the continual efforts at progress of the world community will ensure that atrocities like these will not be committed again," Iraqi Ambassador to the United Nations Hamid al-Bayati said during an event at U.N. headquarters in New York.
The effects of the attack linger 21 years later, he said.
"The rate of cancers, and miscarriages and birth defects has increased in Halabja compared with the rest of Kurdistan or the rest of Iraqi areas," according to al-Bayati.
"I will call on the international community, especially the U.N., to commemorate this day every year to make it the day of genocide, the day of chemical weapons used against the people of Kurdistan -- and to remind the world every year that such kind of attack by chemical and other kind of gases should be studied to see the effect of these kind of weapons," he said (Edith Lederer, Associated Press I/Yahoo!News, March 16).
In Halabja, wreaths were placed on a monument for those killed in the attack, AP reported.
"The anniversary has become etched in the memory of many people," said Aras Abbadi, who said the attack killed 21 family members. "Every year, we wait for the anniversary and condemn that deplorable attack committed by a dictatorial regime against its own people" (Robert Reid, Associated Press II/Yahoo!News, March 16).