Genocide process continues in disputed areas

When Kurds speak about the Kurdish genocide, they usually mean the Anfal. But the Anfal is just the peak of it. Genocide is a long process which develops step by step from ”milder” forms to massacres and total annihilation of the target group.

One genocidal method which Saddam Hussein used was deportation. Almost all Kurdish villages were burnt and villagers were forced to move to cities and towns. In Kirkuk the Ba'athist regime deported 200 000 Kurds.

It practised also statistical falsification to make the Kurdish proportion of population to look smaller. Because of this target Kirkuk province was divided to several provinces. This is statistical genocide.

Instability continues in Kirkuk, Mosul and elsewhere in the disputed areas. It is called terrorism and security problem. But we must speak with correct terms: Sunni Islamist terrorism in disputed areas continues the Ba'athist genocide process.

The target of referendum as described in Article 140 is to correct the effects of deportation and to let people to decide whether they want to return to the pre-Ba'athist situation.

Due to delay of the referendum situation in the disputed areas remains unclear. Reconstruction of buildings and public services is delayed. It is difficult for deported people to return to their home areas.

And not just this: people still escape from the disputed areas, especially from Mosul province. Bomb explosions occur in areas where the inhabitants belong to ethnic or religious minorities. Terrorists attack Yezidis, Kakais and Assyrians. People escape to safe areas controlled by KRG or to Europe. One by one, not in such massive operations than during the Saddam days.

But the effect is the same: when Christian and Yezidi families leave, Arabization continues in areas which have been centuries multi-cultural and multi-religious. This is one step in the genocide process, not just terrorism. When Al Qaida makes bomb explosions in other countries it does not lead to deportation of some people from their homes. The damages of terrorist attacks are repaired and life returns back to normal.

International community must regocnize the true character of terrorism in the disputed areas as a genocidal process, not call it just a security problem. The Kurdish genocide in Mosul and Kirkuk started during the 1920s. When the Ottoman Empire collapsed Britain took part of it as its colony. It could not decide what to do with Mosul and Kirkuk. So nowadays Britain has a historical responsiblity to search a permanent solution to stop the genocidal process in the disputed areas.

Iraqi Kurdistan is a post-genocidal society

Photo: Chamachamal the 13th April 2010.

In April Kurdistan was mourning the anniversary of the Anfal. There were ceremonies in many places, for example in Chamchamal and in Kalar. In these ceremonies and in mass media the symbol of the Anfal was pictures of Anfal widows, women in black clothes with a permanent sorrow on their face.

Their destiny is horrible. But when news about the Anfal are always visualised by pictures of Anfal families, it gives audience a false idea that the Anfal affected only those families who lost their members. A genocide affects the whole society for a very long time, for many generations. The pain of mother whose child disappeared is easy to see. But the wider effects of the Anfal are hidden. They have an impact on all Kurds. Kurdistan is a post-genocidal society.

182 000 Kurds were murdered in the Anfal campaign. Their destiny is a crime which must be surveyed in criminal investigations. Effects of the Anfal on the Kurdish society is another issue. Mass media shows the Anfal usually as the dissappearance of a huge amount of people but it is also other atrocities. Many villages were burnt in spring 1988. Villagers who survived the Anfal, were forced to leave their homes. They were deported to towns.

They are also victims of the Anfal. Their situation must be understood. I do not mean "that the KRG must help them" as people here in Kurdistan say about every problem. When Kurdish villages were destroyed, a huge amount of Kurdish culture and knowledge disappeared.

Until the end of 1980s Kurds were active producers. Kurdish villages were self-sufficient, they could produce everything by methods which had been passed from generation to generation for decades, maybe for centuries. Knowledge which was suitable especially to Kurdistan's conditions.

Autoritarian regimes want to make people passive and dependent of the state. Also the Baath regime behaved this way. When Saddam deported Kurds to central villages his target was to prevent Kurds producing their food themselves and make them dependent of the government.

The Ba'ath regime is gone, but Kurds have not become self-sufficient. They are dependent of another government, the KRG. Active producer society has turned into a passive consumer society and food is imported from abroad.

How to change the situation?

People demand help from KRG to every problem. But this way of thinking is not the solution, it is part of the problem. People must solve the problems by themselves, not wait that some one provides ready solutions.

I know this is huge task. And it is not the fault of Kurds that Baath regime destroyed their production systems and society.

There is need for wide perspective research about the effects of the Anfal, not only documentation of the atrocities. It is the only way to understand all effects of the Anfal. It is the first step in searching solutions to problems of a post-genocidal society.