Biography

Sheikh Muradkhan was born in 1921 in the village of Vazhi, affiliated with the Piran sub-district in the Mergasor district of Erbil province. On June 21, 1932, he and his family became refugees in the Republic of Turkey. Before going to the Soviet Union, he was married; his wife's name was Aisha, who passed away due to illness before his return from the Soviet Union. He had a daughter named Naz Sheikh Murad (1946). After returning from the Soviet Union, Sheikh Muradkhan was employed as a clerk in the Kirkuk Agriculture Department in 1959. In 1961, he remarried; his second wife's name was Khadija Salih Mustafa, and they had two sons and seven daughters. After the collapse of the Aylul Revolution and in 1979, he was transferred to the Harir complex and worked in the Awatemat factory. He knew three languages: Kurdish, Arabic, and Russian.

Struggle Record

In 1943, he joined the ranks of the Second Barzan Revolution and participated in the battles of this revolution. On August 19, 1945, by order of the Iraqi military tribunal, all his movable and immovable property was seized. On October 11, 1945, after the collapse of the Second Barzan Revolution, he headed to Eastern Kurdistan. On March 31, 1946, he became a Peshmerga in the Barzani force affiliated with the army of the Republic of Kurdistan in Mahabad and participated in the battles of the Saqqez front in the Republic of Kurdistan.

 After the fall of the Republic of Kurdistan in Mahabad and Barzani's return from Eastern Kurdistan to Southern Kurdistan, he participated in the battle of Naghadeh and the battle of Oshnavieh in Eastern Kurdistan. He was also among the Peshmerga who returned to the Shirwan and Mazuri region on April 19, 1947, through the Khwakurk and Barazgir plain via the territory of Northern Kurdistan.

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 his 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 Qotur 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 complex surrounded by barbed wire. They were guarded by a group of soldiers and were 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. On the 23rd of the same month, they were given military uniforms, and under the supervision of the officers of the Republic of Azerbaijan, they were given eight hours of military training daily. At the same time, for four hours a day, they were taught Kurdish language lessons 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 complex 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 across the collective villages of the Soviet Union and worked on the kolkhoz farms (lands that people rented from the government and later gave back the government's share). 

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. He immediately ordered the formation of a committee to investigate the situation of Barzani's companions. Ultimately, the committee's decision was that they should all be gathered in the city of Vrevsky, so 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 implementing article (11) based on the amended Law No. 19 of 1959, he and his companions were granted a general amnesty. 

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

 On July 31, 1983, during the Anfal operation of the Barzanis, he was disappeared by the Iraqi government in Harir.

Sources:

  1. Rikar Mizuri, Women, Displacement, Anfal, and Genocide, First Edition, (Erbil – Minara Printing House - 2010).

  2. Rikar Mizuri, The Tragedy of the Barzanis, First Edition, (Erbil - Haji Hashim Printing House - 2013).

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

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

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

  6. Omar Hamza Salih, Genocide and Crimes of the Ba'ath Regime against the Barzanis 1975 - 1991 from the Perspective of Witnesses and Documents, First Edition, (Erbil - Rojhalat Printing House - 2017).

  7. Karwan Muhammad Majid, The Barzanis from Mahabad to the Soviet, First Edition, (Sulaymaniyah - Paywand Printing House - 2011).

  8. Hataw Magazine, Issue 154, Sixth Year, Erbil, Kurdistan Printing House, Friday, April 15, 1959.

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

  10. Laith Abdul-Muhsin Jawad Al-Zubaidi, The 14 July 1958 Revolution in Iraq, (Baghdad - Dar Al-Rashid for Publishing - 1979), p. 288.

  11. Masoud Barzani, Barzani and the Kurdish Liberation Movement 1931 - 1958, (Duhok - Khabat Press - 1998).

  12. Najaf Qoli Pesyan, From Bloody Mahabad to the Banks of the Aras, trans. Shawkat Sheikh Yazdin, 1st edition, (Pirmam - Golden Jubilee of the Kurdistan Democratic Party - 1996).

  13. Archive of the Encyclopedia Committee of Kurdistan Democratic Party