Frans Cornelis Adrianus van Anraat (born 9 August 1942) is a Dutch war criminal and a businessman. He sold raw materials for the production of

chemical weapons A chemical weapon (CW) is a specialized munition that uses chemicals formulated to inflict death or harm on humans. According to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), this can be any chemical compound intended as ...

Iraq Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to Iraq–Saudi Arabia border, the south, Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq border, the east, the Persian Gulf and ...

during the reign of

Saddam Hussein Saddam Hussein (28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician and revolutionary who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 1979 until Saddam Hussein statue destruction, his overthrow in 2003 during the 2003 invasion of Ira ...

. In December 2005, a court in

The Hague The Hague ( ) is the capital city of the South Holland province of the Netherlands. With a population of over half a million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands. Situated on the west coast facing the North Sea, The Hague is the c ...

convicted him of complicity in

war crimes A war crime is a violation of the laws of war that gives rise to individual criminal responsibility for actions by combatants in action, such as intentionally killing civilians or intentionally killing prisoners of war, torture, taking hos ...

for his role in selling chemical weapons to Saddam's government. He was given a 15-year sentence.Killing of Iraq Kurds 'genocide'
BBC News, 23 December 2005 On appeal, Anraat's sentence was increased to 17 years, then reduced to 16.5 years. He was released from prison in 2015.

Business in Iraq

In the 1970s, Van Anraat worked at engineering companies in

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

and

Singapore Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...

that were building chemical plants in Iraq. Having learned about the trade in chemicals, he founded his own company, "FCA Contractor", based in

Bissone Bissone is a Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality in the district of Lugano (district), Lugano, in the Cantons of Switzerland, canton of Ticino in Switzerland. History Bissone is first mentioned in 735 and again in 854 as ''Blixuni''. In G ...

. Starting in 1984, he supplied thousands of tons of chemicals to Iraq including the essential raw materials for producing

mustard gas Mustard gas or sulfur mustard are names commonly used for the organosulfur compound, organosulfur chemical compound bis(2-chloroethyl) sulfide, which has the chemical structure S(CH2CH2Cl)2, as well as other Chemical species, species. In the wi ...

and

nerve gas Nerve agents, sometimes also called nerve gases, are a class of organic chemicals that disrupt the mechanisms by which nerves transfer messages to organs. The disruption is caused by the blocking of acetylcholinesterase (AChE), an enzyme that ...

. Both gases were used during the

Iran–Iraq War The Iran–Iraq War, also known as the First Gulf War, was an armed conflict between Iran and Iraq that lasted from September 1980 to August 1988. Active hostilities began with the Iraqi invasion of Iran and lasted for nearly eight years, unti ...

, between 1980 and 1988, as well as during the

Halabja poison gas attack Halabja (, ) is a city in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq and the capital of Halabja Governorate, located about northeast of Baghdad and from the Iranian border. The city lies at the base of what is often referred to as the greater Hewraman r ...

the military carried out on Iraqi

Kurds Kurds (), or the Kurdish people, are an Iranian peoples, Iranic ethnic group from West Asia. They are indigenous to Kurdistan, which is a geographic region spanning southeastern Turkey, northwestern Iran, northern Iraq, and northeastern Syri ...

, in 1988, which killed about 5,000 people and injured 10,000 more. The attack was part of the

Al-Anfal campaign The Anfal campaign was a counterinsurgency operation which was carried out by Ba'athist Iraq from February to September 1988 during the Iraqi–Kurdish conflict at the end of the Iran–Iraq War. The campaign targeted rural Kurds because its pu ...

of the Iraqi regime against Kurds in the north of the country. He was wanted by the

Federal Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...

in America for the illegal export of dangerous chemicals.

Arrest and trial

After Van Anraat's arrest upon the request of the US in Italy in 1989, his offices in Switzerland and Italy were searched and documents were confiscated. Van Anraat was released pending extradition and fled to Iraq, where he lived for the next 14 years, was granted Iraqi nationality and given an Arabic name. When Hussein's regime fell in 2003, Van Anraat returned to the Netherlands, where he was interviewed by the

General Intelligence and Security Service The General Intelligence and Security Service ( ; AIVD) is the intelligence and security agency of the Netherlands, tasked with domestic, foreign and signals intelligence and protecting national security as well as assisting the Five Eyes in i ...

about his involvement with Hussein. He was arrested on 6 December 2004, for complicity in

war crime A war crime is a violation of the laws of war that gives rise to individual criminal responsibility for actions by combatants in action, such as intentionally killing civilians or intentionally killing prisoners of war, torture, taking hostage ...

s and

genocide Genocide is violence that targets individuals because of their membership of a group and aims at the destruction of a people. Raphael Lemkin, who first coined the term, defined genocide as "the destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group" by ...

, after police realised that he was planning to flee the country. On 23 December 2005, he was sentenced to 15 years in prison for complicity in war crimes, but the court decided that the charges of

complicity in genocide Complicity in genocide is illegal under international law both for individuals, as part of international criminal law, and state parties to the Genocide Convention. The latter was first held in the Bosnian genocide case (2007) in which the Internat ...

could not be substantiated. The court also ruled that the killing of thousands of Kurds in Iraq in the 1980s, was an act of genocide. In the 1948

Genocide Convention The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (CPPCG), or the Genocide Convention, is an international treaty that criminalizes genocide and obligates state parties to pursue the enforcement of its prohibition. It was ...

, the definition of genocide is "acts committed with the

intent to destroy Genocidal intent is the specific mental element, or , required to classify an act as genocide under international law, particularly the 1948 Genocide Convention. To establish genocide, perpetrators must be shown to have had the '' dolus speciali ...

, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group". The Dutch court said that it was considered "legally and convincingly proven that the Kurdish population meets the requirement under the Genocide Convention as an

ethnic group An ethnicity or ethnic group is a group of people with shared attributes, which they collectively believe to have, and long-term endogamy. Ethnicities share attributes like language, culture, common sets of ancestry, traditions, society, re ...

. The court has no other conclusion than that these attacks were committed with the intent to destroy the Kurdish population of Iraq." Both the public prosecutor and Van Anraat appealed the verdict. In May 2007, the appeals court sentenced Van Anraat to 17 years in prison. The charge of complicity in multiple war crimes explains the extra two years, but he was not found guilty of complicity in genocide. In June 2007, the Dutch Supreme Court confirmed the sentence but reduced the imprisonment to 16 years and 6 months. Anraat was released from prison in 2015. The same year, an appellate court confirmed a ruling which required that Anraat pay €25,000 each to 16 plaintiffs in a civil suit against him.

Informant for the Dutch secret service

Shortly after the arrest of Van Anraat, several Dutch newspapers reported that Van Anraat had been an informant for the Dutch

secret service A secret service is a government agency, intelligence agency, or the activities of a government agency, concerned with the gathering of intelligence data. The tasks and powers of a secret service can vary greatly from one country to another. For i ...

, the

AIVD The General Intelligence and Security Service ( ; AIVD) is the intelligence and security agency of the Netherlands, tasked with domestic, foreign and signals intelligence and protecting national security as well as assisting the Five Eyes in in ...

. According to the Dutch press, Van Anraat received protection from the AIVD and was placed in a

safehouse A safe house (also spelled safehouse) is a dwelling place or building whose unassuming appearance makes it an inconspicuous location where one can hide out, take shelter, or conduct clandestine activities. Historical usage It may also refer to ...

of the

Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations The Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations (; BZK) is the Ministries of the Netherlands, Netherlands' ministry responsible for domestic policy, civil service, public administration, elections, relations with local governments, intelligen ...

, in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...

References

External links

Trial Watch: Frans Van Anraat
{{DEFAULTSORT:Anraat, Frans Van 1942 births Living people 20th-century Dutch criminals 21st-century Dutch criminals Dutch businesspeople Dutch expatriates in Iraq Dutch mass murderers Dutch people convicted of war crimes Dutch people imprisoned abroad Iraq–Netherlands relations Iraqi chemical weapons program Kurdish genocide perpetrators People from Den Helder Foreign nationals imprisoned in Italy Prisoners and detainees of the Netherlands