Report Alleges a Pattern of Atrocities Against Iraqi Kurds

CAIRO — A report that could lay the foundation for war crimes charges against Iraq alleged Sunday that forces systematically destroyed a Kurdish village, including mass executions and herding women and children off to death camps.

The report quotes “numerous accounts” that soldiers told starving and cold prisoners, “Saddam has sent you here to die.”

The New York-based Middle East Watch and Physicians for Human Rights, based in Boston, compiled the report of the destruction of Koreme, Iraq, in late August, 1988. The events represent the pattern of government atrocities across Kurdish areas in northern Iraq during 1988, the report said.

Authors said the report proves Saddam Hussein’s government committed crimes against humanity and lays groundwork for charges of genocide to be addressed in subsequent reports. Proving genocide requires evidence of intent to destroy a specific group of people.

The United Nations or some other world organization would have to convene a special tribunal to hear war crimes charges.

Koreme was among the last villages targeted by the Iraqi army in its so-called al-Anfal campaign against the Kurds, named for a Koranic passage describing Islam’s fight against infidels.