By Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary-General and MP for Tanjung, Lim Kit Siang, in Petaling Jaya on Sunday, 14th April 1991.
DAP calls on Malaysian Government to join and play a full role in international humanitarian operation to bring immediate relief to the millions of Kurdish refugees from Iraq
A great human tragedy is being enacted in the Middle East, where the biggest human upheavals since the Second World War is taking place.
A million Iraqis, mostly Kurds, have fled to Iran and almost half a million to the Turkish border since Saddam Hussein’s troops crushed revolts in the Kurdish north and the mainly Muslim south.
It has been estimated that at least 2,000 refugees have died along the Turkish border and hundreds, possibly thousands, more in Iran from hunger and cold.
The international community must mount an international humanitarian operation to bring immediate relief to the millions of Kurdish refugees from Iraq, and the Malaysian Government should join and play a full role in this humanitarian operation.
The donation of US$100,000 by the Malaysian government is a commendable decision to bring relief to the Kurdish refugees but this should only be the first step to a fuller role by the Malaysian Government in the international campaign to bring humanitarian relief to the Iraqi refugees.
The Iraqi government must be reminded of its international commitments and obligations particularly with regard to the Convention of 1948 on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide which requires all States to consider genocide, in war or prevent and punish.
There can no nation which can use national sovereignty to justify the commission of genocide against its own people.