In a message sent Sunday evening on the occasion of the 28th anniversary of 1987 chemical bombardment of the northwestern city of Sardasht by Iraqi Baathist regime, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif called on the international community to prosecute those responsible for supplying former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein with chemical weapons during the Imposed War.
Noting that the silence and inaction of the international community in the wake of the chemical bombardment had led to the deaths of tens of thousands soldiers and defenseless civilians in Sardasht, Zarif urged the international community to carry out their “legal and moral responsibility” towards the victims and their families and facilitate the punishment of the perpetrators and supporters of such inhumane acts.
As an active member of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, the Islamic Republic of Iran, along with other member states, will continue its efforts for the “total annihilation” of all chemical weapons in the world, especially in the US and Russia, Zarif said in the message.
On June 28 and 29, 1987, Iraqi bombers attacked 4 crowded parts of Sardasht with chemical bombs and engulfed its residents with fatal chemical gases. Chemical bombardment of Sardasht was the most awful and disastrous chemical attack during the war which brought many negative effects and consequences.
Sardasht was the first victim of chemical weapons in the world after the nuclear bombardment of Hiroshima.
The US and a number of Western countries equipped the Iraqi regime with the technology and the materials to develop chemical weapons and lent the country their financial support during Iraq–Iran War in 1980–88.