Newroz Dijwar / JINHA

KELAR – Tomorrow will mark the anniversary of the first day of the Ba'ath regime's genocidal Anfal Campaign. Relatives of those massacred say they want the Anfal mass graves opened to heal the wounds they have lived with for 27 years.

The Iraqi Ba'ath regime initiated the Anfal Campaign in 1987 with the goal of wiping out the Kurdish people of Northern Iraq (Southern Kurdistan). The operation killed tens of thousands of Kurds and forced thousands more to abandon their homes for the concentration camps where they were killed. Thousands of Kurdish women were raped and sold in bazaars in the operation. For this reason, recent Daesh attempts at genocide against Kurdish Êzîdî people, including selling women in bazaars,are just one more reminder that Southern Kurdistan has never healed.

Of the seven stages of Anfal, perhaps the most violent took place in Germiyan, where the majority of the 85,000 victims of the campaign were killed.

"The ones who went,went. We still don't know the fate of some of them," said Zeynep Germiyan, an Anfal survivor who lost many relatives in the genocide campaign. "The families left behind hope that one day their children will come back. Many mothers here are still watching the door."

Zeynep's grandmother, one of those "women watching the door," survived abduction and torture during Anfal. She only went free because of an amnesty agreement. Zeynep, who was a child at the time, knows much of what she knows about the genocide from the stories her grandmother told her.

"A lot of my neighbors and childhood friends died in Anfal," she said. "When I go back to the village, I have these memories, like dreams. But all of those people are gone now."

Zeynep says she and other Anfal survivors are waiting for the Kurdistan Regional Government to work to open the uncounted mass graves in the region, most of which, Zeynep explains, are in desert regions near Kuwait.

"There are many undiscovered mass graves. There are ones that have been found, but they're not being opened," she said. "They say it's for economic reasons. They see this as an economic matter." She said that for the families watching the door, the opening of the mass graves could end their 28 years of painful waiting.

Zeynep says the Anfal families are dissatisfied with the level of support that the Kurdistan Regional Government provides them. 90% of Anfal-targeted villages were wiped out in the genocide. Zeynep says there has been insufficient support for the families who try to return to their villages. While there are commemoration ceremonies for Anfal every year, she said, the families of Anfal victims were still suffering.

"These families need to be treated as families of martyrs. But there hasn't been one tree planted. There is no museum showing the photographs. Wouldn't that be better?" she asked.

"Anfal is being forgotten," concluded Zeynep.

(mg/cm)