Journey into Kurdistan

On March 16, 1988, the Kurdish town of Halabja was attacked by the Iraqi Army with a mixture of mustard gas and nerve agents, killing 5,000 civilians, and maiming, disfiguring, or seriously debilitating 10,000 more. The attack occurred in conjunction with the 1988 al-Anfal campaign designed to reassert central control of the mostly Kurdish population of areas of northern Iraq and defeat the Kurdish peshmerga rebel forces. Dr. Patrick Treacy heard rumours about the gas attack when patients from the surrounding area started appearing into the Ibn Al Bitar Hospital in Baghdad with aplastic anaemia. He ventured into the area and for a period became a prisoner of Saddam Hussein.