Tehran sues European firms for aiding Saddam’s chemical attacks against Iranians: Judiciary
…from PressTV, Tehran
[ Editor’s Note: I don’t know if this story had gotten lost, or if Iran had been saving it for a special use, like now. I have never heard of the Sardasht chemical bombing.
When last in Iran, I had young people ask me about the Iranian airliner that got shot down by the US destroyer Vincennes. When they further grilled me on why the captain had gotten the Medal of Honor for the act, I was blown away over how I could have missed that.
After research, I found that the Navy captain William C. Rogers, III, actually received the Legion of Merit for his tour. The final report shows he was criticized in comments made by other officers at the time as an aggressive officer, the kind looking to get some combat distinction put on his record.
In pursuit of that, he had actually used his Aegis destroyer to engage Iranian gunboats, which was overkill on steroids. I view the Legion of Merit award as the Navy’s way of trying to put flowery wallpaper over the event.
From Wikipedia: Three years after the incident, Admiral Crowe admitted on American television show Nightline that Vincennes was inside Iranian territorial waters when it launched the missiles…Three years after the incident, Admiral Crowe admitted on American television show Nightline that Vincennes was inside Iranian territorial waters when it launched the missiles.[30]
These overseas trips can be great for the interactions that one would never get otherwise. That included lots of people who had relatives killed by Saddam’s missile use in random bombardments of Iranian cities. And they remembered being in the bomb shelters as kids with the crying women.
Iranians don’t forget these events, nor should they. But despite the past issues with the US, they treated the New Horizon tour members with the greatest respect.
They all wanted peace with the US, as they knew a foot would remain on the brake pedal for turning their economy around and holding back their plans and dreams. Nothing has really changed much since then… Jim W. Dean ]
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First published … March 05, 2021
The head of the Iranian Judiciary’s High Council for Human Rights says Iran has filed lawsuits in international courts against European companies that provided chemical materials to former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s regime, who used chemical weapons against Iranians in the 1980s war.
Ali Baqeri-Kani made the remarks on Thursday in a meeting with families of the martyrs of the Sardasht chemical bombing during a visit to West Azerbaijan Province.
Baqeri-Kani said the Judiciary has filed lawsuits for more than 200 of the victims of Saddam’s chemical attacks, and final verdicts have been issued for 70 of the cases.
He lamented that the same countries which “brutally” butchered the Iranian people through their “chemical weapons” are now “arrogantly” violating the rights of the Iranian people through their “economic and political” tools, making a reference to their use of sanctions and international institutions against Iran.
“The governments that are exerting the highest amount of pressure and the most extensive sanctions against the Iranian people today are the ones that provided Saddam with chemical weapons, prevented international action against the Ba’athist regime and prevented media coverage of Saddam’s crime,” he stated.
He further said the same Western countries that suffocated civilians in Sardasht neighborhoods now claim to champion human rights in Geneva fortresses.
The official went on to invite Western rulers to hold their next so-called human rights meeting in Sardasht, so that they closely see the effects of their atrocities against the Iranian people.
“In the Sardasht crime, although Saddam played the role of the executioner in the most criminal way, the approach and action of some Western governments were certainly not less than the role of the executioner,” Baqeri-Kani said.
Those governments, he continued, consciously and deliberately produced and sold chemical weapons to Saddam, supported him in the international arena and suppressed media coverage of his crime in order to shift public opinion in their favor.
Sardasht, a small city in Iran’s West Azerbaijan Province, was targeted by Saddam’s Iraq on June 28, 1987, when Iraqi bombers attacked four densely populated parts of Sardasht with fatal chemical gasses.
Sardasht was the third city after Japan’s Hiroshima and Nagasaki to become the target of weapons of mass destruction. At least 110 people were killed and 5,000 more were injured during the attack.
Iraq have launched over 350 large-scale gas attacks along the Iran-Iraq border between 1980 and 1988 on combatants and non-combatants, leaving behind over 107,000 victims.
As many as 2,600 of that total died at the time, and more than 45,000 others were left in permanent need of treatment.
Saddam possessed a huge arsenal of chemical weapons, which were reportedly produced using materials supplied by the US and other Western countries. Iranian officials have on numerous occasions urged the international community to bring the perpetrators to justice.
Jim W. Dean is VT Editor Emeritus. He was an active editor on VT from 2010-2022. He was involved in operations, development, and writing, plus an active schedule of TV and radio interviews. He now writes and posts periodically for VT.
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The US, Israel and EU supplied the components for Saddam’s chemical weapons program AND instructed him to commingle the CW with conventional weapons. He did as directed and killed 100,000 Iranians. What he didn’t use on Iran was used against the Kurds. The little bit left was found but could readily be traced to the US and Israel, so probably went to Georgia.
When are we going to run these warmongers out with pitchforks….they deserve it.
The reason why you didn’t hear about Sardasht, the first major use of CW in battle since WWI, was because t the time the US propaganda line was that both countries were using CW when in fact Iran was woefully underprepared to defend against CW too and not able to even buy chemical suits (had to settle for ill-fitting NK design that resulted in mass death). The US also tried to shift the blame for Saddam’s gassing for the Kurds in Halabja onto Iran – a lie that is still with us today (along with other atrocity propaganda, ie: Iran used children to clear minefields etc). Iran later developed CW capability but refused to resort to their use not even in self-defense (as allowed by intl’ law back then) because of moral and religions prohibitions, and accepted the casualties that today touch 100,000 from CW – matching WWI. At the time of the Iran-Iraq War of 1980-88, Saddam was a US ally and Iraq had been removed from the State Sponsors of Terrorism list by Reagan in 1982 to ease the transfer of dual-use CW items there, and also to license other countries to sell US-origin stuff there but this also included selling stockpiled Soviet weapons from the US “Bear Spares” and from US-allied third countries like Egypt. Read the Teicher Affidavit https://www.nytimes.com/1995/02/05/world/us-supplied-arms-to-iraq-ex-aide-says.html
GOSH we forget important events ! The Iranian airline 655 downed by the USS Vincennes killed all 290 people aboard !!
Iran have the right to claim compensations for this, and the US Navy error excuse is a damn pity !!!
Iran ought to perform a YEARLY memorial of this so-called… accident (crime against humanity), and keep asking heavy compensations à la Gaddafi false Lockerbie compensations.
Same AF pilot told me that on first day of the first gulf war, air transports and bombers filled thems loves you up with tons of slaughtered pig guts and carcasses…maybe live be pigs too why not… and so that very first day they dropped the payloads of pig heads and intestines right on top of the front line trenches of Iraqi soldiers.
He said all the soldiers panicked got up and ran away …
That’s what he said anyways
Typo:
“filled themselves up”
In 1991 I painted the inside of a small house rented by about 3 Aie Force pilots near Tacoma Washington. It was right at the beginning of the first gulf war.
They flew the big 4 engine transport jets, some of their friends flew B52s and one had just crashed near Spokane and they would choke up describing the crash. These guys were “kids” , about 22 yrs if age
Sorry, clicked post before finishing….anyways one of the pilots told me about the Vincennes – at least this is what he heard and believed about it – there were two Iranian fighter jets right behind the airliner, being shielded from radar by lining up straight behind it as the airliner approached the Vincennes. When the airlineer went down, the two jets were exposed and quickly swooped away. Personally I dont believe it and he was told this story so the shoot down was justified in self- defense but really in reality it was mass murder.
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