Yusuf Salman Yusuf - Early Communist Activity and Travel Abroad

Early Communist Activity and Travel Abroad

In 1927, Yusuf met Piotr Vasili, an undercover emissary of the Comintern, who introduced him to socialism and communism. He took part in the first communist circle established that year in al-Nasiriyya.

Two years later, in 1929, Yusuf left his job at the Electricity Supply Authority and applied for a passport to travel abroad. His application was refused due to his lack of funds, but he left the country anyway, traveling through Khuzestan, Kuwait, Syria and Palestine. In the course of this voyage he appears to have attempted to contact the Comintern and to have asked the Palestine Communist Party for funds to help him engage in political work in Iraq.

In 1930, the Anglo-Iraqi Treaty was signed, leading to widespread anger in Iraq. Yusuf returned home and a year later was active in organizing the July 1931 strikes in response to the introduction of a new municipal tax. He continued his agitational and propaganda activities in al-Nasiriyya until February 1935, when he left Iraq once more, this time headed for Moscow where he was due to enroll at the Communist University of the Toilers of the East (KUTV) for training as a future leader of communist party activity. He traveled through Syria, France and Italy before arriving in the Soviet Union, where he remained a student until summer 1937. It appears that before his return to Iraq at the end of January 1938, he may have been entrusted with a Comintern mission in Western Europe; he seems to have spent the winter of 1938 in France and Belgium.