Muthanna governor apologizes after Iraqi officer demands Anfal survivor remove Kurdistan flag

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The governor of Muthana province has officially apologized after an Iraqi military officer repeatedly asked one of the Kurds at the unearthing of a mass grave to remove the Kurdistan flag which was draped over his shoulders.

Ahmed Menfi, the governor of Muthana, said in a statement on Tuesday that the officer’s actions were those “of an individual” and did not reflect the governorate’s “attitude and thoughts toward the Kurds.”

“The officer is currently detained until further investigation into the matter,” Menfi added.

During the unearthing of a mass grave, suspected to contain Kurdish remains, in Iraq’s southern Samawah desert, an Iraqi military officer repeatedly asks one of the Kurds present to put down the flag of Kurdistan he was carrying on his shoulders.#Iraq #TwitterKurds pic.twitter.com/0DWwnFgFyp

— Kurdistan 24 English (@K24English) July 30, 2019

The officer’s discriminatory act stirred immediate reactions as Kurdish blocs in the Iraqi Parliament condemned the action and said it undermined and disrespected the Kurdish flag that the Iraqi Constitution officially recognizes.

Musana Amen, head of the Kurdistan Islamic Union bloc in the Iraqi Parliament, told Kurdistan 24 the “act of hatred” was in direct violation of the constitution and “negatively affects the unity and coexistence of different ethnicities in Iraq.”

On July 23, a mass grave was unearthed in Iraq’s Samawa city that contained the remains of Kurdish civilians buried alive during the former Iraqi Ba’ath regime’s Anfal campaign.

In the 1980s onward, the Iraqi regime under Saddam Hussein undertook a campaign of genocide against the Kurds in the north. Led by the infamous Ali Hassan al-Majid, also known as “Chemical Ali,” the operation resulted in the deaths of up to 182,000 ethnic Kurds.

A large number of people, including women and children, were forcefully displaced and transferred to camps in southern Iraq, where the government eventually killed them and consigned them to mass graves, burying others alive in the desert.

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany