Nova Scotia/Nunavut Command of The Royal Canadian Legion www.ns.legion.ca 79 continued ... Sammy Sampson graduated from high school in Nova Scotia on 22 June 1988. Less than two months later, at 18, he was serving with United Nations forces on the Iraq-Iran border as a radio operator, where a ceasefire had recently been reached between the two countries after almost eight years of fighting. In northern Iran, Sampson operated communications equipment and protected unarmed military observers who reported to the UN about Iranian military actions near the border. A similar team operated in Iraq. Isolated and watched by Iranian commandos, the Iranian-Iraqi body exchanges in no man’s land were one of the few times Sampson met another Canadian outside his three-person team. It was there, in an Iranian compound, he says he quickly grew up and became a problem solver. Still a teenager, he developed a toughness that served him throughout his military career. While his friends were in university, Sampson was gaining real life experience in peacekeeping and war. The first year he was deployed internationally was also the year the 1988 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to the United Nations’ blue helmet peacekeeping forces, for their collective efforts in the cause of peace around the globe, including the efforts of the UN Military Observation Group in Iran-Iraq. Following his deployment in Iran, he served in the Gulf War and was one of the first Canadians to enter Kuwait City, helping re-establish the Canadian diplomatic mission and capturing Canada’s first prisoner of war since Korea. But it was in Rwanda as a peacekeeper with the second United Nations Assistance Mission in Rwanda (UNAMIR II), that Sampson’s young life changed completely. Rwanda, a small rural nation in central Africa, is roughly half the size of Nova Scotia. Two distinct ethnic groups, the Tutsis and Hutus, make up the most of its population. For centuries, the two ethnic groups were rivals in Rwandan society. However, the country was forever changed when on 6 April 1994 the Hutu president of Rwanda was assassinated, launching the country into a nightmare of violence that escalated into one of the worst genocides of the 20th century, resulting in the deaths of 800,000 innocent Rwandans and displaced millions more. Warrant Officer (Ret’d) Kevin ‘Sammy’ Sampson Nova Scotia
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