CRSV: Iraq during the Anfal Campaign

This case note documents the occurrence of sexual violence in violent conflict. It contains explicit mentions of different forms of sexual assault. Reader discretion is advised.

Background of the Conflict

The Iraqi-Kurdish conflict was a series of wars, rebellions, and disputes between the Kurdish people and the central authority of Iraq, which began in the 20th Century after the fall of the Ottoman Empire during World War I. During this time, one of the major instances of violence was the Anfal campaign, a counterinsurgency operation carried out by Ba’athist Iraq from February to September 1988. This campaign specifically targeted rural Kurds, intending to eliminate the Kurdish rebel groups and to Arabize the strategic parts of the Kirkuk Governorate. During this time, the Ba’athist regime committed a large number of atrocities targeting the local Kurdish population (Kirmaanj & Rafat, 2021). During this time, an estimate of 50,000 and 100,000 deaths ensued according to Human Rights Watch (1993), whereas another estimate by Makiya (1992) suggests that it ranged between 100,000 and 180,000 deaths. However, a ruling by a 2007 Hague Court ruling indicated that there wasn’t sufficient evidence to amount to genocide (Hiltermann, 2008), although the classification of the events as constituting a genocide is foundational to the constitution of the Kurdish National Identity (Montgomerry, 2001).

Prevalence of Sexual Violence

During the Anfal campaign, while there are accounts of sexual violence, they have not been described or documented at a massive scale. Anecdotal evidence suggests that sexual violence was carried out against women in incarceration camps (Moradi, 2016). Some studies show that 100,000 women were abducted and raped during the Anfal campaign (Das, 1997). Most instances of rape and sexual violence were perpetrated by Iraqi forces targeting Kurdish women (Hardi, 2016).

Basis of the use of Sexual Violence

Sexual violence and rape were used as parts of the larger campaigns of ethnic erasure and genocide, targeting women from the Kurdish community. It was also used as a means to humiliate and intimidate Kurdish women, and by extension, their communities. It was part of a systemic campaign of torture to target women from the Kurdish community, as recognized by the Iraqi High Tribunal (Prosecutor v. Ali Hasan Al Majid).

References

• Das, V. (1997) quoted in Hardi, C. “Sexual abuse during genocide and its aftermath: Silences from Anfal”, Sexual abuse and exploitation of women in violent conflict, Netherlands Defence Academy and Emory University Law School, Amsterdam, 17-19 June 2007, 2.

• Hardi, C. (2016). Gendered experiences of genocide: Anfal survivors in Kurdistan-Iraq. Routledge.

• Hiltermann, J. (2008). "The 1988 Anfal Campaign in Iraqi Kurdistan". Mass Violence & Resistance. Sciences Po.

• Human Rights Watch (1993). Genocide in Iraq: The Anfal Campaign against the Kurds.

• Kirmanj, S. & Rafaat, A. (2021). "The Kurdish genocide in Iraq: the Security-Anfal and the Identity-Anfal". National Identities. 23 (2): 163–183.

• Makiya, K. (1992). The Anfal: Uncovering an Iraqi Campaign to Exterminate the Kurds (Harpers Magazine) 5.

• Montgomery, B. P. (2001). "The Iraqi Secret Police Files: A Documentary Record of the Anfal Genocide". Archivaria: 69–99. https://archivaria.ca/index.php/archivaria/article/view/12815

• Moradi, F. (2016). 6. The Force of Writing in Genocide: On Sexual Violence in the al-Anfāl Operations and Beyond. In V. Sanford, K. Stefatos & C. Salvi (Ed.), Gender Violence in Peace and War: States of Complicity (pp. 102-115). Ithaca, NY: Rutgers University Press. https://doi.org/10.36019/9780813576206-008

• Prosecutor v. Ali Hasan Al Majid (Al-Anfal), Appellate Verdict, Case No. 1/ C Second/2006 (Iraq High Trib., Tr.Chamber II, June 24, 2007).