‘Mother of Anfal Victims’ dies after lifetime of waiting for her family’s remains

SULAYMANIYAH — Shawkat Jawhar, widely known as the “Mother of Anfal Victims,” died on Monday after nearly 40 years of waiting for the return of her family members’ remains, according to Tahsin Hamid, head of an Anfal-related organization.

“She lost 23 relatives to the Anfal campaign, including sons, daughters, cousins, and grandchildren,” Hamid told 964media. “She had been waiting for their remains to be returned for 37 years,” he added.

Anfal, conducted between Feb. 22 and Sept. 6, 1988, was a systematic genocide orchestrated by Iraq’s Baath regime targeting the Kurdish population. The campaign involved eight phases and led to the mass killing of an estimated 50,000 to 100,000 Kurds, according to a 1993 Human Rights Watch report. Kurdish sources believe the number could be as high as 182,000.

According to Hamed, Shawkat was born in 1917. She was among the survivors of the notorious Nugra Salman prison, where she was held for more than six months and witnessed the inhumane events that took place there.

Constructed in 1930 near the village of Salman in the Muthanna, Nugra Salman was used extensively during the 1980s, especially during Anfal, to detain thousands of Kurds. The prison is seen as a symbol of the Baath regime’s brutal repression.

“Her resilience and patience were like that of a mountain,” Hamid said. “The shock of losing 23 family members deeply affected her life, and since then, she had been waiting for their return.”

Shawkat lived for years in Rzgari subdistrict, Garmian, with her brother’s family.