Biography

Sharif Qurtas was born in 1932 in the village of Zarara, located in the Goratu sub-district of Mergasor district in Erbil province. On June 21, 1932, he and his family fled to the Republic of Turkey. On October 11, 1945, following the collapse of the second Barzan revolution, he and his family headed to Eastern Kurdistan. His father, Qurtas, passed away from typhus in the village of Qalatan. He studied in the Soviet Union and was admitted to Tashkent University on February 15, 1954. On March 29, 1959, he was able to obtain his diploma, and in 1959 he worked as a lecturer teaching students. He passed away on December 21, 2019, in an Erbil hospital and was buried in the cemetery of the village of Zarara.

Struggle Record

Sharif Qurtas was among the Peshmerga who returned to the Shirwani and Mizuri region through the territory of Northern Kurdistan via the Khwakurk route and the Bazargir plain on April 19, 1947.

After their return, General Mustafa Barzani held a meeting with his companions on May 15, 1947, in the village of Argosh and gave them the choice to stay or head towards the Soviet Union. There, all the companions decided to continue and head towards the Soviet Union. On May 23, 1947, he accompanied General Mustafa Barzani towards the Soviet Union and participated in the Battle of Qatur and the Battle of the Maku Bridge. After much hardship and fatigue, on June 18, 1947, he crossed the Aras River, which is located on the border between Iran and the Soviet Union, into the Soviet Union.

After arriving in the Soviet Union, on June 19, 1947, he and all his companions were placed in the city of Nakhchivan in the Republic of Azerbaijan for forty days in an open-air compound surrounded by barbed wire, guarded by a group of soldiers, and treated like prisoners of war in terms of food, clothing, and movement. Later, by the decision of the Soviet government, they were distributed among the regions of Aghdam, Lachin, Ayulakh, and Kalbajar in the Republic of Azerbaijan. On December 10, 1947, they were moved to a military camp on the Caspian Sea in Baku, the capital of the Republic of Azerbaijan, and on the 23rd of the same month, they were given military uniforms and underwent eight hours of military training daily under the supervision of officers of the Republic of Azerbaijan. At the same time, for four hours a day, they were taught the Kurdish language by some of their companions who were literate.

After the poor treatment of Barzani's companions by Jafar Baghirov, it was decided to move the military camp on August 29, 1948, from the Republic of Azerbaijan to the Charchuk compound near Tashkent, the capital of the Republic of Uzbekistan, where they continued their military training. 

In March 1949, he and his companions were distributed in groups and squads by train among the collective villages of the Soviet Union and worked on the collective farms (Kolkhoz) (lands that people rented from the government and later gave the government's share back). 

After much effort and sending several letters by General Barzani to Stalin, a letter finally reached Stalin in which Barzani described the hardships of his companions. Stalin immediately ordered the formation of a committee to investigate the situation of Barzani's companions, and the committee's final decision was that they should all be gathered in the city of Vrevsky. Therefore, he went to the city of Vrevsky in the Soviet Union in November 1951.

After the July 14, 1958 revolution in Iraq and the return of General Mustafa Barzani, on February 25, 1959, and according to both the third and seventh articles and paragraph (a) of the tenth article, and by applying the eleventh article based on the amended Law No. 19 of 1959, he and his companions were covered by a general amnesty. 

In 1958, the Republic of Iraq was established under the presidency of Abdul Karim Qasim. On April 16, 1959, he and his companions returned to Kurdistan via the port of Basra in the south of the Republic of Iraq on the ship Grozia.  

 During the Aylul Revolution, he served as a teacher of the revolution. On December 16, 2010, at the Thirteenth Congress of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, due to his struggle and resistance on the path towards the Soviet Union and the Aylul Revolution, he was awarded by the President Masoud Barzani the Barzani Medal. 

Sources:

  1. Safar Yusuf Mirkhan, The old companion of the immortal Barzani, Teacher Sharif Zarari, has passed away, Khabat Newspaper, organ of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, Issue 5677, Erbil, December 22, 2019.

  2. Sha'ban Ali Sha'ban, Some Political and Historical Information, Third Edition, (Erbil - Rojhalat Printing House - 2013).

  3. Shawkat Sheikh Yazdin, The Golden Jubilee of the Peshmerga, (Pirmam - Khabat Printing House - 1996).

  4. Salih Yusuf Sufi, Chronology of Kurdistan and the World, First Edition, Volume Two, (Duhok - Duhok Governorate Printing House - 2013).

  5. Salih Yusuf Sufi, Chronology of Kurdistan and the World, First Edition, Volume Three, (Duhok - Duhok Governorate Printing House - 2013).

  6. Omar Faruqi, Sardar Dana: Life and Struggles of the Late Mullah Mustafa Barzani, Second Edition, (Erbil - Ministry of Education Printing House - 2002).

  7. From the memoirs of the martyr commander Haso Mirkhan Zhazhoki, 62 Days with Barzani: The Departure of the Barzanis to the Soviet Union, First Edition (Erbil - Roshinbiri Printing House - 1997).

  8. Laith Abdul-Muhsin Jawad Al-Zubaidi, The July 14, 1958 Revolution in Iraq, (Baghdad - Dar Al-Rashid for Publishing - 1979).

  9. Masoud Barzani, Barzani and the Kurdish Liberation Movement 1931 - 1958, (Duhok - Khabat Printing House - 1998).

  10. Naji Taha Barwari, The Companion of the Immortal Barzani, Aziz Qazi, Recounts His Memories, Part Three, Matin Magazine, Branch One of the Kurdistan Democratic Party - United, Issue 49, Third Cycle, Duhok, Hawar Printing House, February 1996.

  11. Archive of the Kurdistan Democratic Party Encyclopedia Board