PM Barzani recalls ‘blatant crime’ on anniversary of Qaladze massacres

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Masrour Barzani on Saturday recalled the anniversary of two massacres carried out by the former Iraqi regime in the city of Qaladze in Sulaimani province.

In a statement, the prime minister said, "On the anniversary of the bombing committed by the Baathist dictatorial regime on April 24, 1974, in the city of Qaladze, that blatant crime that killed hundreds of innocent people, including a group of students from Sulaimani University who were in the city during the time.”

He continued: "On the same date in 1982, the Baathist regime committed another brutal crime by firing live bullets at a march that recalled the victims of the bombing of the city. We salute the memory of the martyrs of the two massacres."

On April 24, 1974, the Baathist regime of Saddam Hussein, formally the Iraqi vice president but effectively the real power in Baghdad, ordered the bombing of the town of Qaladze, razing Sulaimani University to the ground. The attack killed over 130 people, many of them young students.

The assault on Qaladze was one in a series of armed attacks that Baghdad would wage against the Kurdish people after Saddam violated the provisions of a 1970 agreement which laid out a roadmap for establishing an autonomous Kurdish region in the north of the country.

The 1970 understanding was not honored by Baghdad, and the Kurdish struggle against the Iraqi state continued for two more decades, with repeated atrocities committed by Saddam’s regime. The conflict would culminate in the regime’s genocidal Anfal campaign in the latter part of the 1980s when it repeatedly used chemical weapons against the Kurds.

Editing by Joanne Stocker-Kelly