Amna Suraka - Horror and Heartbreak of the Red Security Museum - Sulaymaniye Iraqi Kurdistan
A heartbreaking visit to the Anma Suraka Red Security Operations torture centre in Sulaymaniyah, Iraqi Kurdistan.
This centre was designed by the then-East Germans with the purpose of detention, interrogation and torture of the local Kurds by Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath party regime.
It was operational from 1984 until it was finally liberated in 1991 during an uprising of Kurdish Peshmerga forces and civilians.
During the time of its operation, thousands of innocent men, women and children were held prisoner, tortured then taken to the infamous Abu Ghraib and other centres to be executed.
Exact numbers can't be confirmed as no records have been found.
It was a harrowing experience as we were guided around the facility through rooms where these brutal atrocities were committed.
The barbaric history of this facility is comparable to the Tuol Sleng genocide museum in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
Amna Suraka is now a museum dedicated to highlighting the atrocities committed during this period.
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Sulaymaniyah Iraq City and Amna Suraka Prison
Salaymaniyah Irak Kurdistan and the Amna Suraka a bloody history is captured in this prison turned museum
Amna Suraka in Sulaymaniyah, Iraq
Amna Suraka is one of Saddam Hussein’s “Houses of Horrors”. This is a complex where something bad happened, and you know it. In Kurdish the words “Amna Suraka” translates as “Red Security”. The main building is built of red and brown bricks hence the name. This building has a horrific history. But rather than knock it down and destroy the evidence of what remains, the Kurds saw the opportunity to keep it as it was, turn it into a museum and allow locals and visitors (few and far between) to see the horrors of the Ba ‘ath Party regime run by Saddam Hussein. It’s very cool that they have done that. Sometimes we need to see the horrors of the past to realise how lucky we are and ensure that the future of our children is a happy and hopeful one. We want peace, we don’t want war. Nobody does. Surely.
Visitors of the Amna Suraka today may explore the multi-story administrative building. It’s been left largely as it was the day of its capture by Peshmerga: structurally intact but gutted and studded with holes from warfare. The basement, lit with deep, dark red, contains haunting photographs from the chemical attack in Halabja. Among the images is Ramazan Öztürk’s iconic image Silent Witness. School children on class visits to the museum climb about the various disused tanks and helicopters which sit in the courtyard outside the administrative building.
The central building of the Museum of War Crimes opens with the Hall of Mirrors. What was once the offices and canteen of ranking members of the Ba’ath party is now a hall covered with 4,500 light bulbs representing villages destroyed during al-Anfal, and 182,000 shards of broken glass—for every person killed during the operation. The Hall of Mirrors also contains a replica of a traditional Kurdish home.
Following the Hall of Mirrors are corridors and floors containing the prison cells where prisoners were held, tortured, raped and executed. Some cells are shadowed and empty, with Kurdish Arabic words written or carved out by the people who inhabited the rooms or visitors who followed them. Local artist Kamaran Omar was commissioned to cast five life-size statues of prisoners hand-cuffed to walls, being beaten and hanging from electrical wires. The latter prisoner is accompanied by a recording of an interrogation. Echoing from within these barren, graffitied rooms surrounded with barbed wire, the effects of the recording are chilling. One cell contains a statue of Atta Ahmed Qadir, a Kurdish school-teacher lauded for his courage. Qadir was held in that very cell before his transfer to the Abu Ghraib prison, where he was executed in 1990.
The Amna Suraka shares features with Cambodia’s Tool Seng prison of the Khmer Rouge: both buildings were used not just to imprison and torture, but as weapons for genocide. Both are urban prisons, with residences very nearby. Both have been preserved by the nations of the forces which liberated them to be correctives of history. And both leave the traveler stricken for having walked the halls and rooms where humans caused so much suffering and where humans suffered so much.
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FORMER TORTURE CENTER SULAIMANIYAH
Amna Suraka Prison / Museum Sulaimani
Red Intelligence (Security) Prison (Museum). Erected 1979 to house the security and intelligence apparatus of the former Saddam Hussein's regime in order to subdue Iraqi Kurds. Liberated 1991 and later turned into a Museum. Director Ako Ghareb, artist (writer & painter). One of the most brutal prisons, interrogation & torture centers, and dungeon of contemporary Iraq. Located in a former Ba'ath intelligence headquarters and prison in Sulaimaniyah, provincial capital of SE Kurdistan Region Iraq. Red because of the red-like colour of the building. Symbol for Kurdistan Region Iraq's tortured past. Draws attention to brutal treatment of Iraqi Kurds in the past.
the natlonal museum of amna suraka not to be forgotten in Sulaimani (salam saloo)
photography
salam saloo
the natlonal museum of
amna suraka not to be
forgotten
in Sulaimani
Iraq: Kurdish museum hosts exhibition for IS victims in Saddam-era prison
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The Amna Suraka National Museum in the northern Iraqi city of Sulaymaniyah has dedicated a space to war victims of the so-called Islamic State (IS; formerly ISIS/ISIL).
Named 'Museum for the Martyrs in the War against ISIS,' the section exhibits mannequins and photos of Kurdish Peshmerga and YPG (People's Protection Units), soldiers who died fighting IS in Iraq and Syria.
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The Red Prison: Amna Surka in Iraqi Kurdistan
Sana & Dene introduce the Red Prison.
رۆژی ڕاپەڕینی سلێمانی، گفتوگۆی گەنجان ٦-٣-٢٠١٩ ڕووداو
راپۆرتێكی تایبەتی كەناڵی جەزیرە لەسەر شوێنەوارەكانی ناو مۆزەخانەی سلێمانی
Slemani Museum Sulaymaniyeh Kurdistan Iraq January 2014
Taybat-mozaxanay sliamani
☀️ 360° Saddam's Red Security Prison | Sulaymaniyah, Iraqi Kurdistan
360° video tour of the prison-turned-museum Amna Suraka. A short while after my first visit to the museum, I read a Vice article which echoes many of my thoughts about the place ( ): an essential, but difficult, experience. Make sure you stop by, if in Sulaymaniyah.
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Amna Suraka
If walls could speak, the Amna Suraka museum would tell tales of unimaginable horrors at the hands of Saddam Hussein's intelligence services, the Mukhabarat. The 17,000 square feet compound encloses several buildings that were once used by Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath regime as offices, torturing chambers and cells. The first prisoners arrived in 1986 and were liberated in 1991, following a series of uprisings throughout the region – the vast majority of the prisoners were Kurds. In 2000 the haunting building was turned into a museum, a project spearheaded by Hero Talabani, PUK member and wife of former Iraqi president Jalal Talabani.
The imposing buildings have been left exactly as they were following the violent uprising – a myriad of bulletholes and shattered windows speckle the fading red facade. The courtyard has been turned into a garden of roses and is now home to a display of Iraqi weapons left behind by the invading army. Tanks, mortars and artillery weapons line the sides of the garden.
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0:21 Central courtyard of the museum
0:42 Guard tower and small garden
1:00 Courtyard of tanks, mortars and artillery weapons captured from Saddam Hussein's army by the Peshmerga in 1991
1:24 Inside a captured military vehicle
1:45 Inside a captured tank
2:05 Atop of one of the largest captured tanks
2:30 A sculpture dedicated to victims of the torture prison
2:51 The bullet-ridden former prison administration building
3:32 A small, peaceful, trellised garden tunnel next to the tanks
4:05 Some Peshmerga soldiers putting the world to rights
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Camera: Ricoh Theta S ( )
Thanks for watching!
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How to view the 360° video:
Desktop using Google Chrome:
Use your mouse or trackpad to change your view while the video plays.
YouTube app on mobile:
Move your device around to look at all angles while the video plays
Google Cardboard:
Load the video in the YouTube app and tap on the cardboard icon when the video starts to play. Insert your phone in cardboard and enjoy.
More info here: ????????
#kurdistan #iraq #travel
ڕاپەڕینی سلێمانی 7/3/1991
ڕاپەڕینی سلێمانی 7/3/1991
Showing an American traveler Saddam's Security Prison/ Sulaimaniyah, Iraqi Kurdistan.
Video tour of the prison- turned- museum Amna Suraka.
???? 360° GoPro Omni VR: Amna Suraka | Sulaymaniyah, Kurdistan ☀️
A 360° GoPro VR Tour video of the Amna Suraka complex; formerly a place of detention, dolour and death for Kurds when in the hands of the Iraqi Ba'athist Party, Amna Suraka has now been transformed into a museum dedicated to the aforementioned atrocities. It has been described as 'the world's most depressing museum' due to the rawness and preservation of the so-called Red Security Prison - a must, sombre visit for visitors to Sulaymaniyah. ☀️
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Camera: GoPro Omni
Music: Private Reflections - Attitude
Thanks for watching!
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How to view the 360° video:
Desktop using Google Chrome:
Use your mouse or trackpad to change your view while the video plays.
YouTube app on mobile:
Move your device around to look at all angles while the video plays
Google Cardboard:
Load the video in the YouTube app and tap on the cardboard icon when the video starts to play. Insert your phone in cardboard and enjoy.
More info here: ????????
#gopro #slemani #kurdistan
Niaz Bayati - Amna Suraka Museum ,Sulaymaniyah 2012
Paper Art Exhibition in Amna Suraka Museum ,Sulaymaniyah 2012
ئەمنە سورەکە بۆچى داخرا؟
لەم ڕاپۆرتەدا وردەکارییەکەى بزانن
????Zahir Hawlery ????
☀️ 360° Saddam Hussein's Captured Tanks | Sulaymaniyah, Iraqi Kurdistan
360° video tour of the captured tanks in the prison-turned-museum Amna Suraka. The tanks were captured during the 1991 Sulaymaniyah Kurdish Uprising ( ). Here is an interesting written account from the LA Times, at the time ( ).
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Amna Suraka
If walls could speak, the Amna Suraka museum would tell tales of unimaginable horrors at the hands of Saddam Hussein's intelligence services, the Mukhabarat. The 17,000 square feet compound encloses several buildings that were once used by Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath regime as offices, torturing chambers and cells. The first prisoners arrived in 1986 and were liberated in 1991, following a series of uprisings throughout the region – the vast majority of the prisoners were Kurds. In 2000 the haunting building was turned into a museum, a project spearheaded by Hero Talabani, PUK member and wife of former Iraqi president Jalal Talabani.
The imposing buildings have been left exactly as they were following the violent uprising – a myriad of bulletholes and shattered windows speckle the fading red facade. The courtyard has been turned into a garden of roses and is now home to a display of Iraqi weapons left behind by the invading army. Tanks, mortars and artillery weapons line the sides of the garden.
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Pandorama360 Tour of Amna Suraka:
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Camera: Ricoh Theta S ( )
Thanks for watching!
✣ ✤ ✣ ✤ ✣ ✤ ✣ ✤ ✣ ✤ ✣ ✤ ✣ ✤ ✣ ✤ ✣
How to view the 360° video:
Desktop using Google Chrome:
Use your mouse or trackpad to change your view while the video plays.
YouTube app on mobile:
Move your device around to look at all angles while the video plays
Google Cardboard:
Load the video in the YouTube app and tap on the cardboard icon when the video starts to play. Insert your phone in cardboard and enjoy.
More info here: ????????
#kurdistan #iraq #travel
Amna Suraka vehicle museum
Minor corrections: I believe both tanks are T-55's although I could be mistaken. I also referred to the BTR's as BRDM's.
The prison was liberated during the first gulf war, not the second.