◆ SpookStack

163IHQl462938 After the mass disappearance of the men, the surviving women and children were taken out during the night and driven off in the direction of Khalifan, three hours to the northeast of Erbil. At a place called Alana, they were dumped in an open plain on the banks of the river, and left to fend for themselves. They were reunited here with the Balisan Valley villagers who had fled to Suleimaniyeh. At Alana, the mother who had escaped from the Amn jail in Erbil was reunited with her children. She recognized families from the villages of Kaniberd, Tutma, Sheikh Wasa, and Balisan, who told her that many children had died in place from hunger, thirst, and exposure. On the basis of interviews with four survivors, and with a number of medical and morgue personnel in Erbil, HRW determined a rough estimate of the numbers who died as a result of exposure to chemical weapons. There were 24 deaths in Balisan as a direct result of exposure to chemical weapons; these people were buried in a mass grave in the village. There were 103 deaths in Sheikh Wasan, including approximately 50 buried in a mass grave in the government complex in Seruchawa. The dead included: 33 children under the age of four 28 children between the ages of 5-14 9 elderly people aged 60-85 8-9 dead at the hospital at Raniya 4 dead on arrival at the Erbil Emergency Hospital 64 -142 deaths in the Amn jail in Erbil. The deaths in the Amn jail were the result of untreated injuries sustained in the chemical bombing, aggravated by starvation and neglect. The victims included two ' 17