Wiriya Rawenduzy was born 28 October 1929 in #Rawanduz#, a small town in Iraqi Kurdistan, near the border to Iran, with a rich historic background. In the area nearby in a valley of the Great Zab river Ralph Solecki and a team from Columbia University New York, USA, excavated 1957-1961 the first adult Neanderthal skeletons in Iraq dating back 60-80,000 YBP. Father Muhammed Amin Rawanduzy was an Army Officer, Mayor of Rawanduz and, in 1938, together with Rafiq Hilmi (1898-1960), co-founder of the Hiwa (Hope) Party, which wanted to secure autonomy and self-rule for Kurdistan. Mother Nadjia Fatah was a teacher. Wiriya had six siblings: 3 sisters named Piroz, Hewy, and Jan, and 3 brothers called Zozek, Chatto, and Azad.

He attended Elementary School until 1941, and Secondary Grammar School until 1948. One year later, in 1949, he started to study medicine at Baghdad University. As student he was actively committed to campaign for freedom, self-rule, democracy, human rights and social justice for Kurds in Iraq. Because of his political activities and participation in protest demonstrations, he soon got into conflict with the ruling authorities of the then British dominated Kingdom of Iraq, overthrown in 1958 by a military coup. In 1953 Wiriya Rawenduzy was dismissed from the Medical Faculty in Baghdad, applied to several universities abroad for admission, and was finally accepted by the University of Vienna.

He arrived in Vienna August 1953, finished his medical studies in minimum time and graduated in medicine at the Vienna University in 1961 (MD). He became a leading international activist for Kurdish rights in Europe since the end of the 1950s and early 1960s. He was co-founder of the “Kurdish Students’ Association in Europe”, and in 1963 of the Committee for the Defence of the Rights of the Kurdish People. At the same time he started numerous social projects for Kurds in need from Europe to Eurasia. Also in 1963, he married his Austrian born wife Edith. First son Simko was born in 1967, second son Alan in 1969. In the 22nd borough of Vienna he opened an own surgery as specialist in internal medicine, which he ran until his retirement in 2000. As medical doctor he used to treat uncounted people in need free of charge, Kurds, Austrians and others alike. His surgery was later taken over by his son Simko in 2000. Wiriya Rawenduzy worked also with Austrian Red Cross for decades.

He was head of the Blood Donation Programme of Red Cross in Vienna, and organized numerous relief efforts and actions, private and Red Cross supported, for Kurds in various countries of Near East and Eurasia. Notably, he provided Kurdish refugees, who fled from poison gas attacks of the Iraqi army end of the 1980s and beginning of the 1990s mainly into Iran, several times with urgently needed medication. In December 1975 Wiriya Rawenduzy helped to end without further bloodshed the raid on Opec headquarters in Vienna by a group of terrorists commanded by Ilich Ramirez Sánchez, called Carlos, during which three people had been killed already. Rawenduzy was asked by the Austrian authorities to volunteer by joining the terrorists on an enforced escape flight to Algeria with 42 hostages in order to take medical care of the wounded terrorist Hans-Joachim Klein.

He accepted, acted successfully and thus helped to end the terrorist attack of 1975 without further bloodshed at the end. Later, he was decorated for his outstanding merit by the Silver Medal of Honour for Services to the Republic of Austria. In 1976,www.ekurd.netwhen Austria accepted a first contingent of Kurdish refugees from Iraq, after the bloody suppression of the armed struggle of the Iraqi Kurds for freedom under Mustafa Barzani (1903-1979), Wiriya Rawenduzy helped to organize for them a new live and future in Austria. Since then, as doyen of the Kurds in Austria, he was a leading personality in efforts to integrate Kurds in the diaspora in Europe. Austria is seen as successful model for the integration of Kurds. At the same time, he continued to support as medical doctor MD the struggle of the Kurds for freedom in Near East and Eurasia.

On many occasions, he provided the Kurdish resistance movements in Iraq and Iran with much needed medical aid and assistance. He was a man of dialogue and had very close relations with most Kurdish leaders in all parts of Kurdistan, especially with the acting Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, with the Autonomus Kurdistan Region President Massoud Barzani or the late Iranian Kurdish leader Abdul-Rahman Ghassemlou, who was assassinated 1989 in Vienna. Wiriya Rawenduzy died 1st September 2011 after heart surgery in Vienna. He passed away peacefully. He was a great Kurd and true Austrian of our time, who supported the struggle of the Kurds for freedom, democracy, human rights and social justice in Near East, and was at the same time a leading personality in efforts to successfully integrate Kurds in the diaspora in Europe. Last but not least, he was one of the best friends of the author, who encouraged him to explore Kurdish History and Culture.

Ferdinand Hennerbichler
Vienna, September 2011.[1]