Baghdad
Kurdish witnesses told of the horrors of poison gas attacks as Saddam Hussein’s second trial, this one for attempted genocide of Kurds, resumed this week. “At night, I heard the screaming of women and children,” said Ghafour Hassan Abdullah, describing a 1988 attack on his Kurdish village. From the witness stand, he sneered at the former Iraqi dictator, saying, “Congratulations, Saddam. You are in a cage.” Saddam was silent during the testimony, but he interrupted when a prosecution lawyer described Kurdish rebels as freedom fighters. “You are agents of Iran and Zionism!” he shouted. “We will crush your heads!” Iraqi forces killed some 180,000 Kurds, mostly civilians, during the crackdown in 1987 and 1988.
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