Part 2 – The Red Building fall

 

 

After long nights in the dark and the fear of dying from the fierce fights that was raged on for the past few days between the Kurdish fighters (Pesh Margah) and the government of Saddam Hussein in early March 1991, there was loud shouts of victory.
we emerged out of our basement after the men in the house investigated outside and made sure it was safe to be out… it was early in the evening… the triumphant joyful shouts and cheers of many was so loud we could hear it form all around the city of Sulimany.
some ran and cheered to make sure everyone knew, the government fell. Some sang and danced, some shot bullets up in the air in a celebratory way. Some congratulated people and some even erupted in loud cries remembering their loved ones that were killed in the hand of the government. I was just giggling … giggling and laughing out loud in disbelief that such powerful military government can fall in the hands of Kurdish fighters who’s been mercilessly and systematically killed in the hands of Saddam and his thugs, in the name of Baa’th Party.

The disbelief of all of us and loud laughter turned into tears, we cried and looked at each other, hugged and laughed while crying and some of us hurried to dress up and wear shoes & go out in to the city and see how our city looked without the government.

The fear-stricken town and its people were in fear no more. All we feared was stray bullet falling from the sky from all those celebratory shots up in the air…

We hugged random people and congratulated each other as we walked the 2 blocks towards the infamous police station/ intelligence headquarters.

We continue to laugh, cry and say ‘I can’t believe this is happening’ as we approach the brave Kurdish fighters, some of them where being treated on the side of the road for wounds etc., we thank them and ask them to reassure us, ‘did the Baa’th really fall?’
they answer ‘yes, those cowards are gone … ((Bezzhee Bezhee Kurdistan)) –Long live, Long live Kurdistan))

That continued until that (Red Building) came to our full view. It was terrifying from there on. Every step we took it got uglier and uglier. The smell of burning rubber, papers, wood and flesh was in the air. Smoke was coming from the building and some rooms were still engulfed in fire but people were so hysterical of the fact that the government fell, they were entering the building to see with their own eyes what’s inside.

Besides, some where there for the looting; some –like us where there for the sheer curiosity of what was behind those walls.

There were dead bodies of men dressed in green Baa’th party uniforms with their blood trailing more than a block down the street, some were burned and some just got shot before our eyes are they pleaded with the mobs who were chanting celebratory cheers & pointing guns at anyone in uniform.

It was horrible… some men were in military uniforms… some were strangely in pajamas. We were told they fought for the past few days non-stop that’s why they not even dressed.

I saw with my own eyes, execution chambers, crematorium inside that building, torturing rooms, prisons as small as walk in showers –inside it, a bucket for toilet, portable cabins with beds and camera installed at the other end of the room, ripped clothes of women and even little girls underwear, women prison with walls covered with words of desperate women writing their last ever written words. Desperate sad, scary words….

The days the followed, were happy filled with celebrations but mounting fear became real as the regime gathered his army and was heading straight towards our town. Armed with jet fighters, helicopters, tanks and strong army that was pulled from the Kuwait borders.

Also the (Mujahedeen Khalqu) the Anti-Iranian fighters who were being harbored by Saddam’s government were utilized by our desperate leader to fight alongside the army to gain power of the northern Iraq.

The threat became stronger and stronger as the Allied Forces backed out of Iraq and left us to fend for ourselves.