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Historical glimpses of Iraq's mass graves
on first anniversary
16.5.2007
By Adel Fakher
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Thousands of Saddam Victims Unearthed since 2003
May 16, 2007
Baghdad, Iraq, -- In 2004, on the first
anniversary of the mass graves perpetrated by the
former Iraqi regime, the Iraqi government declared
May 16 a memorial day to commemorate what it
described as the "hideous crimes committed by the
former Iraqi regime."
In a statement released last week, the Iraqi
government, led by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki,
called on Iraqi people to commemorate the
anniversary and keep it alive in their national
memory.
"Choosing this day to commemorate mass graves
victims is attributed to the finding the first and
biggest mass grave in al-Mahawil in 2003 in the
aftermath of the collapse of the former regime," the
statement explained. On May 16, 2003, local
residents in al-Mahawil found a mass grave
containing more than 2,000 bodies.
According to a report issued then by Human Rights
Watch, "Two significant mass graves have been
discovered near the al-Mahawil military base,
located some twenty kilometers north of Hilla (100
km south of Baghdad ) - one located in an open field
and containing the bodies of more than two thousand
persons, 'the al-Mahawil mass grave' and a second
located some five kilometers away behind an
abandoned brick factory containing the bodies of
several hundred persons, 'the al-Mahawil brick
factory mass grave.'"
"A third mass grave is suspected to exist on the
premises of the military base itself. At least one
other mass grave, just south of Hilla in the village
of Imam Bakr, contained an additional forty bodies
from the same period."
"In all these sites the bodies were buried en masse,
in contact with one another, rather than in
individual plots. Mass graves in this sense are
unusual, and almost always signify that the deaths
were the result of mass atrocities or natural
disasters," the report explained.
"The chaotic and unprofessional manner in which the
mass graves around Hilla and al-Mahawil were
unearthed made it impossible for many of the
relatives of missing persons to identify positively
many of the remains, or even to keep the human
remains intact and separate. In the absence of
international assistance, Iraqis used a backhoe to
dig up the mass grave, literally slicing through
countless bodies and mixing up remains in the
process. At the end of the process, more than one
thousand remains at the al-Mahawil grave sites were
again reburied without being identified.
In addition, because no forensic presence existed at
the site, crucial evidence necessary for future
trials of the persons responsible for the mass
executions was never collected, and indeed may have
been irreparably destroyed," the report added.After
the discovery of these graves, the Iraqi Ministry of
Human Rights set up a draft law designed to
compensate the victims' relatives and submitted it
to the Iraqi cabinet for approval.
According to the High Committee of the Mass Graves
in the Iraqi government, the mass graves were "an
evitable result of the former regime's policy
against the Iraqi people throughout three decades,
reaching a peak in the period from 1979 -2003, when
former President Saddam Hussein monopolized
authority."
The committee further explained that following a
series of mass killings in 1979 that coincided with
Saddam's seizure of power and targeted certain
religious and secular figures, the former president
issued retroactive Decree No. 461 of the year 1980,
ordering the killing of everyone who belonged to the
Shiite Daawa Islamic Party or propagated its
policies.
Thousands of Iraqis were killed and buried in
unmarked mass graves.
According to the website of the committee, the
former Iraqi regime detained a large number of
Kurds, who are loyal to current Iraqi Kurdistan’s
President Massoud Barzani, liquidated and buried
them in southern and central Euphrates provinces in
the early 1980s. |
Iraq mass graves AFP 16 Dec 2006
Iraq mass graves Erik de Castro-Getty 3 June 2006
The chemicals were also used against Iraq's own
Kurdish population, including an attack on the town
of Halabja in 1988 which killed over 5,000 Kurds. |
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One of the gravest crimes committed by Saddam's
regime was the chemical bombardment of Kurdistan's
city of Halbaja on March 16, 1988, leading to the
deaths of 5,000 people, mostly women and children.
In the same year, the then government conducted a
series of campaigns against Kurds in what is known
as the Anfal Campaign. Nearly 182,000 Kurds were
killed and buried in several mass graves all over
Iraq, the website said. In 1991, around 350,000
Iraqis were also believed to have been massacred
following an uprising staged by Iraqis against the
then government.
Moreover, statistics produced by the Iraqi Human
Rights Ministry revealed a mass grave in al-Madain,
24 km southeast of Baghdad, which dates back to
April 4, 2003, four days before the toppling of
Saddam's regime. A total number of 240 mass graves
have so far been discovered in more than 100 sites
all over Iraq.
In a meeting held on November 9, 2006, the committee
stressed the importance of taking samples from
unidentified bodies and numbering them so that they
can be identified in the future by their next of
kin. Addressing the unearthing of mass graves, the
Human Rights Ministry made a effort to have Law No.
5 of the year 2006 issued, which organizes the
unearthing of mass graves.
VOI
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