For years, Umed Rachid, 40, is a guide at the monument erected in memory of the 5,000 victims of the bombing of Halabja poison gas in Iraqi Kurdistan in 1988, during which he lost his family.

16 March at 11:35 (8:35 GMT), combat aircraft of the Iraqi army of Saddam Hussein had begun to fly over the area near the Iranian border, and for five hours, had released toxic gases during what is believed to be the worst gas attack against a civilian population.

“Despite all the pain I feel in doing this work, I want to stay and work here, to tell what happened in Halabja and how I lost my family,” said Umed.

In 1988, when the war against Iran coming to an end, Kurdish fighters, backed by Iran, had taken control of Halabja, in the mountains of Kurdistan.

The Iraqi army responded by shelling the town, forcing the Kurdish fighters to retreat to the surrounding hills, leaving behind women and children.

Some 5,000 people were killed, mostly women and children. Number of survivors continue to suffer from the effects of the poison gas attack.

Teenager at the time, Umed remembers his family trying to flee in a pickup to find shelter when chemical attack began.

He alone has survived. On the way to the shelter, all members of his family died of asphyxiation in the truck. A photograph shows the vehicle carrying about 25 people, including the relatives of Mr. Rachid, stopped on the road, the driver slumped over the steering wheel.

“When we fled Halabja, we saw many martyrs lying in the streets but we could not do anything to help them because we ourselves were already affected by chemical attack,” he says.

Umed Rachid says that he himself had fallen into a coma. Rescuers had even thought he was dead and had put in a coffin.

‘Chemical Ali’ hanged –

Regarded as the sponsor of this massacre, General Ali Hassan al-Majid, known as “Chemical Ali”, cousin and henchman of Saddam Hussein was hanged on 25 January 2010.

Sentenced to death four times, including once for the Halabja massacre, he never expressed any remorse claiming to have acted for the security of Iraq.

The Iraqi government had handed over to local authorities Halabja rope used in the hanging of “Chemical Ali”, on the occasion of the commemoration of the attack in 2012. Halabja Last year marked the 25th anniversary of the massacre .

The memory of the attack has returned to haunt the people of this small Kurdish town last year after that neighboring Syria President Bashar al-Assad has been accused of using chemical weapons near Damascus has claimed hundreds of dead.

“Watching TV and seeing what happened in Syria, I started crying,” recalls Mr. Rachid. “I saw my parents, my sisters and my brothers died.”

Rather than trying to forget the massacre of Halabja population chose to commemorate openly.

On the site where Mr. Rachid, the end of the city, visitors are guided to a small hallway where the walls are lined with photos of the attack and objects, jewelry among other things, that belonged to the victims are exposed.

“It is an honor for me to work here, to tell people what was the tragedy for future generations,” says the guide.