Biography

Babakir Sheikh Hussein Lachin was born in 1931 in the village of Kirkamo, affiliated with the Shirwan sub-district in the Mergasor district of Erbil province. After the collapse of the first Barzan Revolution, when Sheikh Ahmed Barzani and a large number of Barzani families took refuge in Northern Kurdistan, he also became a refugee in the Republic of Turkey on June 21, 1932, when he was only one year old. However, after the Turkish authorities handed Sheikh Ahmed Barzani over to the government of Iraq in 1933, their family, like all the families who had fled to Northern Kurdistan with Sheikh Ahmed, returned to Southern Kurdistan. Due to the lack of schools and the lack of attention by the government of Iraq to education and literacy, he fell behind in his studies, such that when the Second Barzan Revolution broke out in 1943, he was in the third grade of primary school.

After accompanying General Mustafa Barzani to the Soviet Union, he studied at a university there for five years. In 1959, he received a diploma in the technical department of automotive mechanics from the Indostralny Technicum University. He knew three languages: Kurdish, Persian, and Russian. He passed away on March 5, 2020, in the town of Salahaddin and was buried in the cemetery of the village of Kirkamo.

Struggle Record

After the outbreak of the Second Barzan Revolution in 1943 and its continuation until 1945, Babakir Sheikh Sin joined the ranks of the revolution in that year; he was a thirteen-year-old youth and served the Peshmerga by delivering food to the headquarters and the battlefield. For this reason, on August 19, 1945, by order of the military tribunal, all his movable and immovable property was seized.

On October 11, 1945, after the collapse of the Second Barzan Revolution, he crossed over to Eastern Kurdistan with Mustafa Barzani and his companions. After the establishment of the Republic of Kurdistan in Mahabad, he defended the Republic on March 31, 1946, within the framework of the Barzan force.

After the fall of the Republic of Kurdistan in Mahabad and Barzani's return from Eastern Kurdistan to Southern Kurdistan, he participated in the battles of Naqada and Oshnavieh in Eastern Kurdistan. He was also among the Peshmerga who returned to the Shirwan and Mazuri region through (Khwakurk and the Dashti Barazgar) via the territory of Northern Kurdistan on April 19, 1947.

After their return, General Mustafa Barzani held a meeting with his companions in the village of Argush on May 6, 1947, and gave them the choice of staying or heading towards the Soviet Union. There, all the companions decided to continue and go to the Soviet Union. On May 23, 1947, he accompanied General Mustafa Barzani towards the Soviet Union and participated in the Battle of Qotur and the Battle of the Maku Bridge. After much hardship and fatigue, on June 18, 1947, he crossed the Aras River, which lies on the border between Iran and the Soviet Union, into the Soviet Union.

After arriving in the Soviet Union, on June 19, 1947, he and all his companions were placed in the city of Nakhchivan in the Republic of Azerbaijan for forty days in an open-air complex surrounded by barbed wire. They were guarded by a group of soldiers and were treated like prisoners of war in terms of food, clothing, and movement. Later, by the decision of the Soviet government, they were distributed among the regions of Aghdam, Lachin, Ayolakh, and Kalbajar in the Republic of Azerbaijan. On December 10, 1947, they were moved to a military camp on the Caspian Sea in Baku, the capital of the Republic of Azerbaijan, and on the 23rd of the same month, they were given military uniforms and, under the supervision of officers of the Republic of Azerbaijan, were given eight hours of military training daily. At the same time, for four hours a day, some of their companions who were literate taught them the Kurdish language.

After Jafar Baghirov's poor treatment of his companions, Barzani decided to move the military camp on August 29, 1948, from the Republic of Azerbaijan to the Charchuk complex near Tashkent, the capital of the Republic of Uzbekistan, where they continued their military training.

In March 1949, he and his companions were distributed in groups and squads by train among the collective villages of the Soviet Union and worked on the collective farms (the lands that people rented from the government and later gave the government's share back).

After much effort and the sending of several letters by General Barzani to Stalin, a letter finally reached Stalin in which Barzani described the hardships of his companions. He immediately decided to form a committee to investigate the situation of Barzani's companions, and the committee's final decision was that they should all be gathered in the city of Vrevsky; therefore, he went to the city of Vrevsky in the Soviet Union in November 1951.

After the July 14, 1958 Revolution in Iraq and the return of General Mustafa Barzani, on February 25, 1959, according to both the third and seventh articles and paragraph (A) of the tenth article and the implementation of article (11) based on the amended Law No. 19 of 1959, he and his companions were covered by the general amnesty.

In 1958, the Republic of Iraq was established under the presidency of Abdul Karim Qasim, and Sheikh Hussein returned to Kurdistan on April 16, 1959, with his companions by the ship 'Gruzia' via the port of Basra in the south of the Republic of Iraq.  

Babakir Lachin was a bodyguard for Mullah Mustafa Barzani in Baghdad, the capital of the Republic of Iraq, along with Mustafa Abdullah Faqi Nabi and Saeed Ahmed. In 1961, he participated in the Aylul Revolution and was a Sarkol. The first time he was in the village of Bedaron with Idris Barzani and later went to the upper Barwari to be with Mullah Mustafa Barzani, and Sharif Abdullah Faqi Nabi was his superior. In 1962, with Mullah Mustafa Barzani he went to the regions of Qaladiza, Bitwen, and Dukan and participated in the battles of those areas.

After the March 11, 1970 agreement until 1974, he became a border guard, and in 1974 he returned to Mullah Mustafa Barzani. In 1975, after the collapse of the September Revolution, he went to Iran as a refugee, settled in the Zewe complex, and in the same year went to Jahrom and was later transferred to Saveh.

In 1980, he participated in the Gulan Revolution. He participated in the 1991 spring uprising in Southern Kurdistan, settled in Shaqlawa, and later settled in Salahaddin in 1998. At the Thirteenth Congress of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, he was awarded the Barzani the Immortal Medal. He passed away on March 5, 2020, in the town of Salahaddin and was buried in the cemetery of the village of Karkamo.

Sources:

    1. Archive of the Kurdistan Democratic Party Encyclopedia Board

    2. Hamid Gawhari, The Barzani Medal is the Highest Honor Award, Volume One, (Erbil - Haji Hashim Printing House - 2015).
    3. Hamid Gardi, Summary of History, First Edition, (Erbil - Aras Printing and Publishing House - Ministry of Education Printing House - 2004)
    4. Haider Farouk Al-Samarrai, Dhiya Jafar and his Political and Economic Role in Iraq, (London – Dar Al-Hikma - 2016).
    5. From the memoirs of the martyr commander Haso Mirxan Zhazhoki, 62 Days with Barzani, The Barzanis' Journey to the Soviet Union, First Edition (Erbil - Rewshanbiri Printing House - 1997).
    6. Masoud Barzani, Barzani and the Kurdish Liberation Movement 1931 - 1958, (Duhok - Khabat Printing House - 1998).
    7. Text of the General Amnesty Committee decision to restore the reputation of the martyrs of the Barzan revolution, Rizgari Magazine, Issue 2, 3, Al-Rabita Printing House, Baghdad, April 1, 1959.
    8. Archive of the Encyclopedia Board, text of the interview with Babakir Sheikh Hussein Lachin, on January 10, 2016 – Pirmam.