On March 16th, 1988, the Iraqi regime led by Saddam Hussein carried out a chemical attack on the city of Halabja near the Iranian border. The attack left thousands of people dead in the streets, including many women and children, and injured countless others.

This attack is recognized as the deadliest use of chemical weapons in the world. The OPCW has designated this day as the anniversary of the chemical attack in Halabja.

Fortunately, thanks to the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1997, there is now an internationally binding law that prohibits the use of chemical weapons, signed by 193 countries. However, in recent years, there has been a renewed fear of the return of chemical weapons in the world.

The KONCICC calls upon the international community to renew its commitment to the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1997.

The High Criminal Court in Baghdad reviewed the case of the Barzani massacre today, 28th of December 2025, involving three defendants implicated in the disappearance and extermination of Barzani people in Anbar, Fallujah, and the Al-Shiha desert. The defendants are Saadoun Sabri, Jamil Al-Qaisi and Shaker Taha Yahya Ghafour Al-Douri.

Six victims: mothers, sisters, and relatives of the victims of the Barzani massacre attended the session. The court sentenced Shaker Taha Yahya Ghafour Al-Douri. The ruling was upheld based on Articles 12 and 15 of the Iraqi High Criminal Court Law No. 10 and Article 406 of the Iraqi Penal Code No. 111 of 1969 and ordered the release of Saadoun Sabri and Jamil Al-Qaisi due to insufficient evidence proving the defendant’s involvement in the case.

On July 31, 1983, an estimated 8,000 members of the Barzani tribe were rounded up and abducted from their homes in the Kurdistan Region’s Zagros Mountains before being transported to the deserts of southern Iraq, where they were executed on the orders of the Baathist regime. The atrocity was an act of collective punishment of the Barzanis, whose leaders were active in Kurdish revolts against the Iraqi regime. Men and boys were the primary targets, but women, children, and the elderly were all victims. – Rudaw

Other press releases on this case: The new region: Baath-era official sentenced to death for Barzani Genocide , Shafaq: Iraq hands death sentence to ex-Baath officer over Barzani crimes

On 3th september of this year, in Sulaimani Opinion of Sulaimani Province in the hearing of the compensation case of chemical weapons victims against foreign companies.

On September 21, he visited Samawa Court, the National Security Equipment Office, and Karkhi Third Court in Baghdad to investigate the trial of Anfal criminal Hajjaj, head of the evil prison of Ngra Salman military base, who is one of the criminals in the Anfal case.

The Anfal campaign was one of the darkest chapters in modern Iraqi history, a genocidal operation carried out by Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath regime against the Kurdish people between February and September 1988. According to Human Rights Watch’s landmark report Genocide in Iraq: The Anfal Campaign Against the Kurds, the campaign involved mass executions, chemical weapon attacks, forced disappearances, and the destruction of thousands of villages, with evidence drawn from captured Iraqi documents and survivor testimonies