By Dr. Pshtiwan Faraj | Kurdish Policy Analysis For 37 years, one man has risked his life every day so others can walk safely across Kurdistan.
Despite losing both legs, Hoshyar Ali spent 37 years clearing landmines planted during Saddam Hussein's rule, becoming one of Kurdistan's greatest humanitarian heroes.
Hoshyar Ali has fought a 37-year war clearing landmines and unexploded ordnance across the Kurdistan Region. Despite losing both his legs to mines, he refuses to abandon his mission and continues to make Kurdistan safer, clearing thousands of mines and saving countless lives in an extraordinary show of resilience and sacrifice.
Across the mountains and valleys of the Kurdistan Region, countless families farm their land, shepherds graze their livestock, and children play in villages that once stood on some of the world's most heavily mined battlefields. Few stop to think about why those fields are safe today.
Behind that safety stands one extraordinary man.
Hoshyar Ali is not a soldier, politician, or celebrity. Yet for nearly four decades, he has fought one of Kurdistan's longest and deadliest wars—a war against landmines left behind by Saddam Hussein's regime. Even after losing both of his legs in a landmine explosion, Hoshyar refused to surrender. Instead, he returned to the minefields.
His story is not merely one of personal courage. It is the story of Kurdistan's long struggle to reclaim its land from the legacy of dictatorship and war.
A Silent Legacy of Saddam Hussein
Long before the Kurdistan Region became one of Iraq's most stable and prosperous areas, its mountains were transformed into military frontlines.
During the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988), Saddam Hussein's government planted vast numbers of anti-personnel and anti-tank mines along the Iranian border and throughout Kurdish areas.
The Anfal Campaign further devastated Kurdish villages, leaving behind contaminated farmland that remained deadly decades after the fighting ended.
Millions of mines and unexploded ordnance were scattered across the region, creating one of the Middle East's most dangerous post-conflict environments. For ordinary Kurdish families, the war did not end in 1988. Every step into a field could still become a death sentence.
Fighting a War That Never Officially Ended
Unlike conventional soldiers whose battles eventually conclude, deminers fight an invisible enemy.
Every meter of ground must be searched by hand. Every suspicious object may be lethal. Every mistake can be fatal. This has been Hoshyar Ali's battlefield for 37 years.
Working under extreme danger, he has helped clear thousands of landmines and unexploded ordnance, allowing villages to return to agriculture, infrastructure to expand, and displaced families to reclaim their homes.
His work has saved lives not through headlines, but by preventing tragedies that never happened.
Losing His Legs—Not His Mission
Many people would have retired after suffering such catastrophic injuries. Hoshyar Ali chose another path. Despite losing both legs to the very mines he dedicated his life to removing, he continued his humanitarian mission.
His prosthetic legs became symbols of determination rather than limitation. Every return to the minefield demonstrated extraordinary resilience and sent a powerful message: fear would not win. His perseverance transformed him into a symbol of hope across Kurdistan.
Why Kurdistan Calls Him a Hero
Heroes are often remembered for victories achieved in battle. Hoshyar Ali's victories are measured differently. Every mine destroyed means another child can walk to school. Every cleared field means another farmer can cultivate crops. Every safe village means another family can rebuild its future.
His contribution extends far beyond mine clearance. He has helped restore confidence, economic activity, and human security across communities that once lived under constant fear.
Landmine Clearance Is Nation Building
Mine clearance rarely receives the attention given to military victories or political negotiations.
Yet without safe land, reconstruction becomes impossible. Roads cannot be built. Schools cannot expand. Tourism cannot develop. Agriculture cannot flourish. Investment cannot reach contaminated areas. In this sense, deminers like Hoshyar Ali are not simply removing explosives—they are rebuilding Kurdistan from beneath the ground upward.
A Legacy Future Generations Will Inherit
As the Kurdistan Region continues to modernize, many younger generations may never experience the fear that once defined everyday life. That is precisely Hoshyar Ali's greatest achievement. His work ensures that children grow up seeing mountains as places of beauty rather than danger. His life's mission has transformed landscapes once scarred by war into spaces where life can return.
More Than a Deminer
History often celebrates generals and presidents. But history is equally shaped by ordinary individuals whose extraordinary courage changes thousands of lives.
Hoshyar Ali represents the resilience of the Kurdish people themselves—enduring war, surviving tragedy, and continuing to build a safer future despite unimaginable hardship. His story reminds us that true heroes are not always found on the battlefield. Sometimes they are the ones who return to it every day so that everyone else never has to.
The Legacy Beneath the Soil: How Saddam Hussein's Landmine Campaign Still Shapes Kurdistan
When discussions turn to the atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein's Baathist regime against the Kurdish people, the focus often falls on the chemical attack on Halabja, the Anfal Campaign, forced displacement, and mass executions. Yet another weapon of repression continues to claim lives decades after those events ended: landmines.
Unlike bombs that explode once or bullets fired during battle, landmines remain active for years or even decades, silently waiting beneath the soil. They transform farmland into death traps, prevent displaced families from returning home, obstruct economic development, and leave communities living in fear long after the fighting has ceased. In the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, this hidden legacy has become one of the longest-lasting consequences of the Baathist regime's military strategy.
A Strategy of Permanent Denial
During the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988), northern Iraq became one of the conflict's most strategic frontlines. The mountainous border separating Iraq from Iran offered natural routes for military operations and for Kurdish guerrilla forces fighting Baghdad. Determined to deny access to these areas, the Iraqi military embarked on one of the largest defensive mining campaigns in the Middle East.
Extensive belts of anti-personnel and anti-tank mines were laid along the Iraqi-Iranian border, around military installations, across mountain passes, and surrounding countless Kurdish villages. These minefields were designed not only to impede Iranian forces but also to restrict the movement of Kurdish resistance groups that Baghdad viewed as a strategic threat.
As the conflict intensified, minefields expanded further into civilian areas, making no distinction between military targets and the communities that had lived there for generations.
Landmines During the Anfal Campaign
The mining of Kurdistan became even more systematic during the Anfal Campaign of 1987–1988, one of the darkest chapters in modern Kurdish history.
The Baathist regime sought not only to defeat Kurdish armed groups but to depopulate vast rural areas altogether. Thousands of villages were destroyed, hundreds of thousands of civilians were displaced, and entire agricultural regions were rendered inaccessible.
Landmines became part of a broader strategy of collective punishment.
Fields that once produced wheat and barley became too dangerous to cultivate. Traditional grazing lands could no longer support livestock. Roads connecting villages disappeared beneath explosive hazards. Families who attempted to return after military operations often found their homes surrounded by hidden explosives.
In effect, the regime weaponized the landscape itself.
A War That Continued After 1988
Although the Iran-Iraq War ended in 1988, the danger remained. Unlike conventional weapons, landmines do not recognize ceasefires or peace agreements. Every rainy season shifts buried explosives. Every landslide or flood can move mines into new locations. Areas once believed to be safe may become hazardous again years later.
Consequently, the end of open conflict did not mark the end of suffering for Kurdish civilians. For decades afterward, farmers, shepherds, children, and construction workers continued to lose their lives or suffer life-changing injuries while carrying out ordinary daily activities. Many communities found themselves trapped between the desire to rebuild and the fear of stepping onto contaminated land.
An Obstacle to Development
The impact of landmines extends far beyond the immediate human toll. Contaminated land cannot easily be used for agriculture, infrastructure, tourism, housing, or industrial development. Roads become expensive to construct because every meter requires careful surveying. Investment is delayed when uncertainty remains about explosive contamination.
For the Kurdistan Region, mine contamination represented not only a humanitarian crisis but also a major obstacle to economic recovery.
Large areas of fertile agricultural land remained inaccessible for years. Border communities that traditionally depended on farming and livestock faced severe economic hardship. Reconstruction efforts after the establishment of the Kurdistan Regional Government were slowed by the enormous costs associated with surveying and clearing hazardous areas. Mine clearance therefore became an essential prerequisite for development.
The Humanitarian Response
Over the past three decades, Kurdish authorities, Iraqi institutions, international humanitarian organizations, and specialized demining agencies have undertaken one of the region's largest post-conflict recovery efforts. Thousands of hazardous areas have been surveyed and cleared. Millions of square meters of contaminated land have been returned to productive use.
Schools, roads, hospitals, irrigation systems, and villages have been rebuilt only after painstaking mine clearance operations ensured they could be used safely. Yet despite these significant achievements, explosive remnants of war remain a continuing challenge in parts of the Kurdistan Region.
This reality illustrates an important truth about modern warfare: the consequences often outlast the political decisions that created them.
The People Who Reclaimed Kurdistan
While governments negotiate peace agreements and armies eventually withdraw, another group quietly enters the battlefield.
Deminers. Their work receives little international attention despite carrying extraordinary risks. Unlike soldiers confronting visible opponents, deminers face an invisible enemy concealed beneath every step. Each operation demands patience, discipline, and extraordinary courage. Every metal detector signal could reveal harmless scrap—or a device capable of ending a life instantly.
Their success is measured not by territory captured but by tragedies prevented. Every mine destroyed allows children to play safely. Every cleared field enables a farmer to return to work. Every secure road reconnects isolated communities. In this sense, humanitarian deminers have become architects of Kurdistan's recovery.
Why Stories Like Hoshyar Ali's Matter
Against this historical backdrop, the story of Hoshyar Ali becomes far more than a biography of one courageous individual. It becomes a symbol of Kurdistan's broader journey from war toward recovery. After losing both legs while clearing mines, many would have expected him to retire permanently.
Instead, he returned to continue protecting others. His determination reflects values that transcend geography or politics: service, resilience, sacrifice, and hope.
These are themes understood in every society, whether in Bosnia, Cambodia, Angola, Afghanistan, Colombia, or Ukraine—countries where communities continue living with the long-term consequences of explosive remnants of war.
His life demonstrates that post-conflict recovery is not achieved solely through political agreements or economic investment. It also depends upon individuals willing to confront the physical remnants of conflict one mine at a time.
Beyond Kurdistan
For international readers unfamiliar with Kurdish history, Hoshyar Ali's story offers an accessible entry point into understanding the enduring legacy of conflict. It connects historical injustice with present-day humanitarian action.
It illustrates how the effects of authoritarian rule continue decades after regimes disappear. Most importantly, it reminds us that rebuilding societies requires more than ending wars—it requires restoring the confidence that ordinary people can once again walk across their own land without fear.
This is why stories like Hoshyar Ali's possess universal appeal. They are not simply narratives about Kurdistan or Iraq. They are stories about humanity's capacity to confront the enduring scars of war with courage, perseverance, and compassion. In honoring those who dedicate their lives to making former battlefields safe again, we also recognize that true peace is measured not only by the absence of conflict, but by the return of ordinary life to places where fear once ruled every step.
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