Biography

Sharif Qurtas was born in the year 1932 in the village of Zarara, which belongs to the Gorto sub-district in the Mergasor district of Erbil Governorate. On June 21, 1932, he became a Refugee with his family in Turkey. On October 11, 1945, after the setback of the second Barzan revolution, he headed with his family to Eastern Kurdistan. His father (Qurtas) died as a result of contracting the typhoid Illness in the village of Qalatan. Sharif Qurtas studied in the Soviet Union and was accepted on February 15, 1954, at Tashkent University, and was able to obtain a diploma on March 29, 1959. He worked as a lecturer teaching students in the year 1959. He died on the date of December 21, 2019, in one of the hospitals in Erbil, and his body was laid to rest in the cemetery of the village of Zarara. 

Struggle Pages

Sharif Qurtas was among his Peshmerga comrades who returned to the Shirwan and Mizuri region on April 19, 1947, via (Khwakurk and the Barazgro valley) across the lands of Northern Kurdistan. 

  After their return, General Mustafa Barzani held a meeting with his comrades in the village of Argosh on the date 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, to 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. Afterwards, he was transferred 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 by 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 the form of groups by train to the collective villages in the Soviet Union and worked on the Kolkhoz farms (lands that people used to rent from the government and then pay a share of it to the government). 

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, Sharif Qurtas 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, and on February 25, 1959, he and his comrades were included in the general amnesty according to Articles (3) and (7) and Paragraph (A) of Article (10) and the implementation of Article (11) under Law No. (19) amended for the year 1959.

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

He assumed responsibility as a teacher during the era of the Aylul Revolution, he was awarded the Barzani Medal by President Masoud Barzani on December 16, 2010, during the convening of the Thirteenth Congress of the Kurdistan Democratic Party in appreciation of his struggle and sacrifices during the march with Barzani and his comrades to the Soviet Union and during the Aylul Revolution. 

Sources:

  1. Safar Yusuf Mirkhani, The old Comrade of the immortal Barzani, Teacher Sharif Zarari, has passed away, Khabat Newspaper, organ of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, No. 5677, Erbil, December 22, 2019 AD.

  2. Shaaban Ali Shaaban, Some political and historical information, third edition, (Erbil - Rojhalat Printing House - 2013 AD).

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

  4. Salih Yusuf Sufi, Chronology of Kurdistan and the World, first edition, volume two, (Duhok - Duhok Governorate Printing House - 2013 AD).

  5. Salih Yusuf Sufi, Chronology of Kurdistan and the World, first edition, volume three, (Duhok - Duhok Governorate Printing House - 2013 AD).

  6. Omar Farouqi, Sardar Dana, The Life and Struggles of the late Mulla Mustafa Barzani, second edition, (Erbil - Ministry of Education Printing House - 2002 AD).

  7. From the memoirs of the martyr commander Haso Mirkhani Zhazhoki, 62 days with Barzani, the going of the Barzanis to the Soviet Union, first edition (Erbil - Rewshanbiri Printing House - 1997 AD).

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

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

  10. Naji Taha Barwari, The companion of the immortal Barzani, Aziz Qazi, recounts his memories, third part, Matin Magazine, First Branch of the Kurdistan Democratic Party - United, Issue 49, third cycle, Duhok, Hawar Printing House, February 1996 AD.

  11. A.D.A., File No. AI-10, List of comrades of Mustafa Barzani to the Soviet Union, document presented by Sagvan Hallo, 2016 AD.

  12. A.D.A., File No. HB-431, Kurdistan Democratic Party, Barzani Headquarters, High Committee of the Barzan Region, form of Sharif Qurtas Mulla, Pirmam, November 1, 2018 AD.