THURSDAY, March 28, 2024
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VX nerve agent used in Halabja massacre

VX nerve agent used in Halabja massacre

The VX nerve agent used in the murder of Kim Jong-nam on Feb 13 was reported to have been widely used during the Halabja massacre in Iraq by Saddam Hussein in 1988.

According to various news reports, in March 16 of that year, attacking aircraft peppered the Kurdish-Iraqi town of Halabja with canisters of chemical weapons including VX, resulting in the deaths of 3,500 to 5,000 people within minutes.

Another 7,000 to 10,000 people were reported injured, crippled or suffered long-term health problems.

The incident, which has been officially defined by the Supreme Iraqi Criminal Tribunal as genocidal massacre against the Kurdish people in Iraq, was and still remains the largest chemical weapons attack directed against a civilian-populated area in history.

It was reported that the regime of the then President of Iraq had committed one of the worst atrocities of the modern era in his campaign against the Kurds and other ethnic groups in northern Iraq.

The story of the VX nerve agent surfaced in Malaysia when Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar revealed that VX was found following preliminary analysis of dry swabs of the eye mucosa and face taken from Jong-nam.

Jong-nam, the estranged half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, was at the KL International Airport 2 on Feb 13 to board a flight to Macau when two women wiped his face with the palms of their hands which contained a chemical.

Jong-nam sought help at a customer service counter at the airport and was rushed to the Putrajaya Hospital but died on the way.

It was reported that the VX nerve agent could have been possibly used earlier during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s.

The use of another type of deadly nerve agent, sarin, was reported in the rebel held suburbs of Ghouta, near Damascus, Syria, on Aug 21, 2013.

It was reported that sarin was used in the surface-to-surface artillery rocket attack that killed about 1,000 people there.

The UN report said samples found by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons-designated labs to contain the nerve agent, sarin, were recovered from a majority of the rockets or rocket fragments inspected. - Bernama

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