The bodies of more than
500 Iraqi Kurds killed by Saddam Hussein's regime in
the 1980s have been returned to the north of the
country for burial.
They were found in mass graves near the border with
Saudi Arabia.
A ceremony was held to mark their return on Monday,
only two days before Saddam Hussein is due to go on
trial.
One by one, more than 500 coffins draped in the
Kurdish flag were carried solemnly passed a guard of
honour on the tarmac at Irbil airport.
It is believed the remains belong to members of the
Barzani clan. |
The coffins were met by an honour guard and the
Iraqi president
Photo : AFP
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Eight thousand of them were rounded up by Saddam
Hussein's forces in 1983 in reprisal for a Kurdish
guerrilla attack near the Iranian border.
They were trucked away to the south. Their bodies
were discovered in a mass grave in the desert near
the Saudi border.
Tip of iceberg
This was the first time that some of the thousands
of Kurds who disappeared under Saddam Hussein's rule
have been brought home for burial.
This is just the tip of the iceberg, according to
Mohammed Issan, minister for human rights in the
Kurdistan regional government.
"The minimum picture, without any exaggeration, is
350,000 missing Kurds," he said.
"I think all these numbers we are going to find in
mass graves because we've managed now to identify
284 sites of all the Kurdish mass graves inside the
country now."
Accounting for the Kurdish victims, as for the Shia
in the south, is a monumental task which may never
be completed.
On hand to pay respects to the returning remains was
Massoud Barzani, now president of Iraqi Kurdistan,
and at his side, Iraq's first post-Saddam president,
Jalal Talabani, himself a Kurd.
The Kurds are now in charge of their own affairs in
the north. They are determined never to be dominated
again.
www.bbc.co.uk
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