Assyrian Christians Look to Breakdown Roadblocks

Following a series of Church Bombings, targeted attacks and bullying of Assyrian Christians in Baghdad, a mass exodus of Assyrian Christians from Iraq to the neighbouring countries was recently revealed by various media reports.

Most Assyrian Christians live in Mosul, Iraq’s third largest city, which is situated 396km north of Baghdad, therefore Mosul has the highest proportion of Christians of all Iraqi cities. Geographically, Mosul used to be the ancient “Nineveh”. According to the Bible, Jonah was sent by God to this city to proclaim the message of God, later all the Ninevites immediately repented and turned to Him. Assyrian Christians are actually the original people of Iraq, they have a rich cultural and spiritual background even though nowadays their numbers are few compared with the Muslim majority.

The lack of religious freedom in Iraq has suppressed the lives of Christians. Most of the reports have portrayed a worrying future for this minority group; some even said that Christians will be threatened to extinction in the next year if the situation does not improve.

However, Rev Ken Joseph Jr., Director of the Assyrian Christian Assistance Centre in Baghdad, has seen a new hope through the Iraq Donors Conference in Tokyo and two other recent conferences held in New York and Washington DC, even though there are still a lot of roadblocks ahead.

Assyrian Christians have taken the initiative to hold all these meetings over the past few weeks. They have aimed at seeking the international community’s support for an area of self-government centred around Assyrian Christians, and then they are going to implement some plans to recover their war-torn city.

The first meeting was in New York where meetings were held with the Prime Minister and others in attendance in conjunction with the opening of the United Nations General Assembly. Later, there were a series of meetings in Washington D.C. with the Assistant Secretary of State, Richard Armitage and his staff.

The meetings in the U.S. were proved to be fruitful. The members of Congress gave their tacit approval to the plan, said Rev Joseph Jr. The State Department responded positively said, “If the Iraqi Government supports the concept of an autonomous area under Article 53 of the Constitution [the Transitional Administrative Law] we would not object.”

In addition, the Iraqi Donor Conference meeting held in Tokyo, Japan with the World Bank, UN, Japanese Government and Iraqi Government representatives has secured Assyrian Christians welfare supports from the international community, so called “Five R’s” plan. (See previous article)

The World Bank signed a $60 million grant agreement with Iraq’s Ministry of Education to finance the construction of new buildings for over 100 schools, and urgent repairs to 140 primary and secondary schools across 18 governorates. The Emergency School Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Project represent an important step for creating a better future for the Iraqi people.

The autonomy of the Assyrian Christians is a very essential step for them to receive international aid properly for recovery of their community. Rev Joseph explained, “A report from the European Union concluded that aid and infrastructure assistance was not getting to the Assyrian Christian community in Iraq in spite of massive amounts of support being distributed throughout the country.”

“MEP Albert Jan Maat believes elements of ‘religious favoritism’ are the main reason behind the phenomena. International aid is mainly distributed through regional and therefore Moslem leaders and seldom or never reaches the Assyrians, so the community was facing a very difficult time,” he continued.

In addition, the upcoming election in January is another roadblock in the way to the autonomy of Assyrian Christians. The concern has risen from a meeting with the Director of the UN Election Commission currently, said Rev Joseph Jr.

“The electoral system being put together favours large and organised parties to the detriment of smaller ones which could be very bad for the small, Assyrian Christian Community and a strange opposition on the part of the UN to absentee voting, favoured by the Iraqi Government are worries,” he said.

“It almost seems as if the UN is setting up an electoral system that guarantees that Iraq will become an Islamic state like Iran against the will of her people, first by the system itself and then by denying the most progressive voters - those living overseas the vote.”

Rev Joseph noted that a recent conference of Christians from the Middle East in Washington revealed that 78 percent of all Americans of Middle Eastern background in the United States are not Muslim but Christian. That’s why these votes are determinative to the final result.

“They force us to accept groups and individuals in the desire for inclusiveness that we feel we should not. We are determined to create a secular, democratic state but it often seems like the International Community is pushing for a radical, Islamic nation which all Iraqis strongly oppose,” lamented one commentator.

Despite all these roadblocks, Rev Joseph Jr. expressed unchanging hope in the future of Assyrian Christians by the promise of God, “When we succeed with these we will be on the way to a viable area for our people that we believe will not only strengthen the whole of Iraq but encourage many of our people who have left the country to return. We believe in spite of many problems the best is ahead because we believe in the Biblical promise that we will have our land.”