Biography

Sheikh Zubair was born in 1925 in the village of Rzyan, which belongs to the Barzan sub-district in the Mergasor district of Erbil Governorate. After going to the Soviet Union, he married Khoshi Ahmed Yusuf, and they had three sons and two daughters: Israfil Sheikh (1951), Asfandi Sheikh (1953), Zainab Sheikh (1955), Ismail Sheikh (1956), and Zahdia Sheikh (1958). Sheikh Zubair worked as a supervisor on the Boli boat after the March 11 agreement from 1971 to 1975. He was fluent in both Kurdish and Russian, and he passed away on May 13, 2008, and was buried in the village of Rzyan. 

Struggle Pages

He joined the ranks of the Second Revolution of Barzan in 1943 and participated in the battles. On August 19, 1945, all his movable and immovable property and assets were confiscated by the Iraqi Military Tribunal. On October 11, 1945, after the setback of the Second Revolution of Barzan, he moved to East Kurdistan. On March 31, 1946, he joined the Barzani forces belonging to the army of the Democratic Republic of Kurdistan in Mahabad and participated in the battles of the Saqqez front. He returned to the Shirwan and Mazuri region on April 19, 1947, via (Khwakurk and the Barazgaro plain) through the lands of North Kurdistan. 

  After their return, General Mustafa Barzani held a meeting with his comrades in the village of Argosh on 15/5/1947 and gave them the choice between staying or going to the Soviet Union. There, all his comrades decided to continue and head to the Soviet Union. On May 23, 1947, he accompanied General Mustafa Barzani to the Soviet Union. He participated in the battles of Wadi Qatur and the Maku Bridge, and after great hardship and severe exhaustion, he crossed the Aras River on June 18, 1947, into the Soviet Union, which is located on the border between Iran and the Soviet Union.

After their arrival in the Soviet Union, on June 19, 1947, he and all his comrades were detained in the city of Nakhchivan in the Republic of Azerbaijan for forty days in an open compound surrounded by barbed wire guarded by soldiers. They were treated as prisoners of war in terms of food, clothing, and transportation. By a decision of the Soviet government, they were later distributed to the regions of Aghdam, Lachin, Yevlakh, and Kalbajar in the Republic of Azerbaijan, 

and afterwards, he was moved with his comrades on December 10, 1947, to a camp on the Caspian Sea north of the Azerbaijani capital, Baku. Military clothing was distributed to them, and they were trained daily for eight hours under the supervision of officers from the Republic of Azerbaijan. At the same time, they were receiving lessons in learning the Kurdish language for four hours daily from some of their educated comrades.

After the mistreatment of his comrades by Jafar Baghirov, Barzani decided to move his military gathering from Azerbaijan on August 29, 1948, to the Charchuk compound near the Uzbek capital, Tashkent, where they continued their military training.

In March 1949, he and his comrades were distributed in groups by train to collective villages in the Soviet Union and worked on Kolkhoz farms (lands that people used to rent from the government and then pay a share to the government from it).

After great efforts and sending several letters from General Barzani to Stalin, Stalin finally received a letter in which Barzani spoke about the suffering of his comrades. Stalin immediately decided to form a committee to investigate the situation of Barzani's comrades, and the committee's decision was finally that they should be gathered in the city of Vrevsky. Therefore, Sheikh Zubair headed with his comrades in November 1951 to the Soviet city of Vrevsky. 

After the July 14, 1958 revolution in Iraq and the return of General Mustafa Barzani, on February 25, 1959, he and his comrades were included in the general amnesty according to Articles (3) and (7), paragraph (a) of Article (10), and the implementation of Article (11) under the amended Law No. (19) of 1959.

The Republic of Iraq was established under the leadership of Abd al-Karim Qasim in 1958. Sheikh Zubair returned with his comrades on April 16, 1959, to Kurdistan on the ship Georgia via the port of Basra in the south of the Republic of Iraq.

He participated in the Aylul Revolution and its battles in 1964. In 1975, after the setback of the Aylul Revolution, the Iraqi government deported him to southern Iraq and he settled in Al-Diwaniyah Governorate. In 1980, he was moved to the Qushtapa community, and in 1982 he moved to the Islamic Republic of Iran as a refugee and settled in the Zeweh compound. In 1985, he moved to the village of Mansurabad during the bombing of the Zeweh compound. In 1992, he returned to Kurdistan and moved to the village of Bekhma, and in 1993 he returned and settled in his birthplace.

Sources:

1- Rêkari Mzuri, Russian Women, Displacement, Anfal, and Genocide, First Edition, (Erbil – Manara Printing House - 2010).

2- Shaaban Ali Shaaban, Some Political and Historical Information, Third Edition, (Erbil - Rojhalat Printing House - 2013).

3- Shawkat Sheikh Yazdin, The Golden Jubilee of the Peshmerga, (Pirmam - Khabat Printing House - 1996).

4- Salih Yusuf Sufi, Chronology of Kurdistan and the World, First Edition, Volume Three, (Duhok - Duhok Governorate Printing House - 2013).

5- Salih Yusuf Sufi, Chronology of Kurdistan and the World, First Edition, Volume Two, (Duhok - Duhok Governorate Printing House - 2013).

6- Omar Farouqi, Sardar Dana: The Life and Struggles of the Late Mullah Mustafa Barzani, Second Edition, (Erbil - Ministry of Education Printing House - 2002).

7- Abdulrahman Mullah Habib Abu Bakr, The Barzan Tribe Between 1931 - 1991, First Edition, (Erbil - Ministry of Culture Printing House - 2001).

8- Abdullah Ghafoor, Geographical Dictionary of Erbil, (Erbil - Kurdish Academy Publications - Haji Hashim Printing House - 2015).

9- Karwan Muhammad Majid, The Barzanis from Mahabad to the Soviets, First Edition, (Sulaymaniyah - Paywand Printing House - 2011).

10- Hataw Magazine, Issue 154, Sixth Year, Erbil, Kurdistan Printing House, Friday, April 15, 1959.

11- From the Memoirs of the Martyr Commander Haso Mirxan Zhazhoki, 62 Days with Barzani: The Departure of the Barzanis to the Soviet Union, First Edition (Erbil - Roshinbiri Printing House - 1997).

12- Laith Abdul-Muhsin Jawad Al-Zubaidi, The July 14, 1958 Revolution in Iraq, (Baghdad - Dar Al-Rashid for Publishing - 1979).

13- Masoud Barzani, Barzani and the Kurdish Liberation Movement 1931 - 1958, (Duhok - Khabat Printing House - 1998).

14- Najaf Qoli Pesyan, From Bloody Mahabad to the Banks of the Aras, trans. Shawkat Sheikh Yazdin, First Edition, (Pirmam - Golden Jubilee of the Kurdistan Democratic Party - 1996).

15- A.D.A., File No. AI-10, List of Mustafa Barzani's Comrades to the Soviet Union, document provided by Sagvan Halo, 2016.

16- A.D.A., File No. HB-432, Kurdistan Democratic Party, Barzani Headquarters, Barzan Region High Committee, Shekho Omar Zubair Abdullah Form, Pirmam, November 1, 2018.

17- A.D.A., File No. ZB-150, Transcript of an interview with Ismail Sheikh Zubair Abdullah by Hushin Haji Baqi, Pirmam, April 15, 2019.