OUTSANDING KURDISH POLITICIAN BEARING WITNESS OF THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE
By H. Chaqrian

AZG Armenian Daily
27/02/2007

Head of the Kurdish autonomy of Northern Iraq, leader of the
"Democratic Party of Kurdistan" Masoud Barzani recently published
a work dedicated to the life and activity of his father, Mustafa
Barzani. Mustafa Barzani’s memoirs about the Armenian Genocide and
mass deportation of Armenians are also included in the work. It is
also noteworthy, that the author’s grand-grandfather, Sheikh Mohammad
Barzani was the religious leader of the Barzani tribe. Sheikh
Mohammad’s son Abdulsalam later obtained both the political and
religious leadership of the tribe. In 1914 Sheikh Abdulsalam was
executed by the Ottoman authorities. After those events his sons
divided the political and religious authority of the tribe.

At this very moment were started the mass repressions of Western
Armenians. Abdulsalam’s son Sheikh Ahmad answered the summons of
Armenian warlord Andranik, who was engaged in the organization of
self-defense of Armenians. Molla Mustafa Barzani tells that he was
among those 200 men sent by Sheikh Ahmad to aid Andranik’s forces. It
should be noted that so as to avoid impact with governmental forces
the brigade was to declare openly that their aim was to take part in
the massacre of Armenians. Unfortunately, the Ottoman government had
convinced the population of the empire that the 1915 events were a
war of Muslims against the Christians, so that necessary lie was not
hard to believe. "We aided the Armenians and accompanied the to the
border of Syria", continues Molla Mustafa. "We were engaged by the
Turkish forces and suffered casualties of 14 men".

On our part we should add that Molla Mustafa Barzani lived a long life
and passed away in 1979, in the Souleymanie town of Northern Iraq. He
was succeeded by his son Masud Barzani, who after his father’s example
became had got involved in the Kurd national movement at the early
age of 16.

All the information was taken from the Turkish
website.