ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iraq’s Prime Minister Mohammed Shia' al-Sudani on Tuesday told Rudaw that his cabinet is “serious” in recognizing the Kurdish city of Halabja as a province.
Answering Rudaw’s Anmar Ghazi during a press conference in Baghdad, Sudani said that “the government is serious about implementing the decision to treat Halabja as an Iraqi province because Halabja deserves many things. It is our duty to support it and its people.”
He added that his cabinet will work on the decision in the future.
The Kurdistan Council of Ministers issued a decision in March 2014 to turn Halabja into a province, making it the fourth province in the Region. Four years later, the Iraqi interior ministry recognized it as a province.
On the last days of the eight-year-long Iran-Iraq war, warplanes of the former regime of Saddam Hussein rained down a lethal cocktail of chemical weapons on the city of Halabja, killing at least 5,000 people, mostly women and children, and injuring thousands of others. The event, which was recognized as an act of genocide by Iraq's High Court in 2010, has left a permanent scar in the historical memory of the Kurdish people.
Halabja used to be a city within Sulaimani province. Some of its residents have complained that not much has changed since its status has been changed to province.
The province has a population of 120,000 and it consists of four subdistricts: Khurmal, Biyara, Bamo and Sirwan. It is a tourism destination.Halabja is also known for its "salaxany" pomegranate. The province introduces large quantities of the produce to Kurdistan's markets annually. Last month, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) began exporting Halabja’s pomegranates to Gulf countries.
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