French Scholar Gérard Chaliand Passes Away at 91, A Lifelong Voice for the Kurdish Cause

ERBIL (Kurdistan24) – Gérard Chaliand, the French researcher, writer, and strategist whose career spanned more than six decades, passed away on Wednesday, in the French capital Paris at the age of 91. His scholarly work left a profound mark on the study of irregular warfare, international conflicts, and national identity movements, with a special focus on the Kurdish question.

Chaliand was among the first Western intellectuals to raise the issue of Kurdish identity and political existence in academic and policy-making circles. As early as 1959, when the Kurdish cause was largely absent from international discourse, he published his first articles on the subject, continuing in the following decades to produce pioneering studies on Kurdish history, politics, and struggles for recognition.

Among his most significant contributions were his books A People Without a Country: The Kurds and Kurdistan (1980) and The Kurdish Tragedy (1994), the latter presented to the United Nations Sub-Commission on Human Rights. He also co-edited The Kurds and Kurdistan: The Kurdish National Question in the Near East (1978), a work that documented the systematic marginalization and denial of Kurdish rights across the region.

Chaliand introduced the term “Anti-Kurdism” to describe the denialist and repressive policies that several Middle Eastern governments pursued against Kurdish identity. He consistently emphasized that the Kurds represented “a nation without a state,” subjected to decades of political exclusion and unrecognized rights.

While acknowledging that Kurdish demands for autonomy and independence emerged later than many other national movements, Chaliand considered the post-1991 Kurdish experience in Iraq to be the most significant turning point, as it allowed the establishment of the Kurdistan Region under international protection and recognition.

Over his lifetime, Chaliand authored more than 50 books, many of which were translated into multiple languages, and he lectured at some of the world’s most prestigious universities, including Harvard and Berkeley. His fieldwork and theoretical contributions made him a leading authority on guerrilla warfare, national liberation movements, and identity-based conflicts.

With his passing, the world has lost one of its most independent and authoritative voices in the study of liberation struggles and stateless nations. For the Kurds, Gérard Chaliand’s intellectual legacy endures as an invaluable reference and a powerful testament to their pursuit of recognition, rights, and dignity on the international stage.