Thousands of people dressed in black joined the Halabja ceremony at the genocide monument and museum.

People came from Sulaymaniyah, Ranya, Kaledizê, Sharbajar, Sharezor, Hewlêr and Behdinan to pay respect to the 5,000 victims.

The people gathered in front of the monument and at 11am the ceremony began. Remembering that life came to a standstill in Halabja that 16 March of 31 years ago, people today held 2 minutes silence after which roses were dropped on the people from a helicopter.

The ceremony was very emotional and the people who lost their relatives in the massacre could not hold the tears. People expressed their anger at the fact that the massacre in Halabja is still being treated as a consequence of the Iraq-Iran war.

Official Ceremony

Regional government authorities, Sulaymaniyah and Halabja governors, PUK (Patriotic Union of Kurdistan) administrators organized the official ceremony to pay tribute to the victims of Saddam’s chemical gas attack in 1988.

After the official ceremony, wreaths were left at the memorial by officials from the regional government, parties, embassies and civil society organizations.

Background

On 16 March 1988 some 5,000 Kurds, mostly women and children, were killed when deadly gas was released on the northern town of Halabja by Saddam Hussein's forces.

A Belgian-Dutch team from Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), the first foreign medical mission to reach Halabja, confirms the use of mustard gas and probably of cyanide.

By March 23, the first images are broadcast on Iranian television. Corpses scatter the streets with no obvious sign of injury, although witnesses say later some had blood around their noses.

An AFP special envoy, Michel Leclerq, describes the horror in a story filed on 1 April: “Not the slightest stir, not a cry, not a movement: Halabja ... seems frozen, immobilised in a deep sleep, while canons thunder in the distance.”

The "houses remain standing, the stores are full" said Leclerq, but "no soul lives here since Iraqi planes released their deadly poison".

It would be 20 years later when General Ali Hassan al-Majid, known as "Chemical Ali" for ordering poisonous gas attacks, is hanged in 2010.

A cousin of Saddam, al-Majid is found guilty of having ordered the attack on Halabja.

He gets four death sentences, including for Halabja, but insists he acted in the interests of Iraqi security and expresses no remorse.

In 2012, the Iraqi government hands the authorities in Halabja the rope used in his hanging.

Saddam Hussein himself is hanged in 2006, three years after the US-led invasion of Iraq.