AMVGK President Denounces Kurdish Genocides in Andorra Conference

Tchiayi Emin, president of the Association Mondiale Des Victimes du Genocide Kurde (AMVGK), delivered a conference on Tuesday at 7:30pm denouncing genocides against the Kurdish people over recent decades, while also sending a letter to Andorran Head of Government Xavier Espot seeking potential institutional, academic, or economic collaboration.

The event, held in a roundtable format, formed part of AMVGK's international awareness campaign launched in 2017 to push for formal recognition of these atrocities and enhanced protection for Kurds. Emin, a Montauban resident with longstanding personal connections to Andorra through frequent visits and contacts with politicians and legal experts, detailed four key episodes his group considers genocides: repressive campaigns in Iraqi Kurdistan during the 1970s and 1980s; the 1983 elimination of more than 8,000 Barzani clan members; the 1988 Anfal operation, which caused 182,000 deaths via chemical bombings, mass executions, and mass graves—many still under documentation; and the 2014 genocide against Yazidis by Islamic State. He cited nearly 840,000 victims in Iraqi Kurdistan alone, excluding effects in Iran, Turkey, and Syria, framing them as a continuous extermination process that has changed form but persists.

A survivor of the Anfal campaign, Emin recounted his escape across mountains, pursuit by Iraqi forces, and ordeal in refugee camps to give a human face to the figures. He highlighted historical and geopolitical factors fuelling Kurdish vulnerability, including the lack of a sovereign state, territorial divisions, cultural repression, and economic exclusion. Under Saddam Hussein's regime, banned chemical weapons and scorched-earth policies targeted northern Iraq's disputed areas, with ongoing cultural and structural pressures today.

AMVGK seeks official recognition of these events as a unified package and international safeguards for Kurdish rights. Emin drew symbolic parallels between Andorra's mountainous landscape and Kurdistan, urging the Principality to serve as a hub for humanitarian awareness on a conflict often sidelined in European discourse.