U.N. to Investigate Reported Chemical Attacks on Kurds
Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar announced Friday that he is dispatching two investigators to Tehran to examine victims of chemical attacks on Kurdish residents of northeast Iraq.
The team is scheduled to arrive in the Iranian capital Monday.
Iran has accused Iraq of having used a mixture of mustard and cyanide gases in a bombing attack on the city of Halabja on March 16, causing as many as 4,000 deaths. The city, inhabited largely by Kurds, was captured by Iran a week earlier. Iraq denied responsibility for the attack, but there have been reports that the Baghdad government has launched reprisals against the Kurds because of their support for the Iranian invaders.
U.N. spokesman Francois Giuliani said that the investigative team will stay only briefly in Tehran, where some of the victims have been taken.
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