Yusuf Salman Yusuf (, ), better known by his nom de guerre Comrade Fahd () (19 July 1901, in Baghdad – 14 February 1949), was an Assyrian of Chaldean Catholic faith and was one of the first Iraqi communist activists. He was the first secretary of the Iraqi Communist Party, from 1941 until his death on the gallows in 1949. He is generally credited with a vital role in the party’s rapid organizational growth in the 1940s. For the last two years of his life he directed the party from prison. Early life Yusuf Salman Yusuf was born in Baghdad in 1901 to a father from Bartella, in the province of Mosul, northern Iraq. His family was humble, and his father is recorded as having made his living selling cakes and sweets. In 1907 he moved with his family to Basra in the south of the country in search of a better livelihood. Yusuf was an ethnic Assyrian and attended the Syriac Christian School in Basra from 1908 to 1914, and the American Mission School in the city from 1914 to 1916. His education was then interrupted as his father had fallen ill and he had to seek employment for the family’s upkeep. He first took a job as a translator and clerk with the British Army in Basra, before moving to Nasiriyah in 1919 to help his brother run a mill. In 1924 he returned to Basra and gained employment as a clerk at the Electricity Supply Authority. He also goes by Fahad Squad. Early communist activity and travel abroad In 1927, Yusuf met Piotr Vasili, a fellow Assyrian and 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