Geography:
The Assyrians’ ancestral homeland is spread out over Northern Iraq, Northern Iran, south-eastern Turkey and south Syria. The region from the Hikkari Mountains to the Mosul district in northern Iraq is the Assyrain nation’s ancestral homeland, with Ninevah as its historic capital.

People:
Population

The total Assyrian population, including the Diaspora, is estimated at 3.3 million, with the majority living in the former Mesopotamia region, which is the Assyrian ancestral homeland covering northern Iraq, northern Iran, south-eastern Turkey and southern Syria. Outside of the Middle East, approximately 93,000 live in Europe, 300,000 in the U.S. and Canada, 64,000 in Armenia, Georgia and Russia, 33,000 in Australia and New Zealand and 150,000 in other countries.

Culture and Language

The Assyrians of today have a strong identity and feeling that they are descendants of the ancient Assyrian people who built the mighty empires of Assyria and Babylon. The Assyrians rose to power and prosperity in Mesopotamia, which today consists mainly of modern Iraq. Assyrians played a major role in the foundation of the civilisation of mankind.

After the fall of the Assyrian and Babylonian empires, respectively in the seventh and sixth centuries BC, the Assyrians were reduced to a small nation living at the mercy of their overlords in the vastly scattered lands in the Middle Eastern region. In the first century they were among the first people to embrace Christianity. It is divided into different denominations including the following four Assyrian rites: Apostolic and Catholic Assyrian Church of the East, Assyrian Orthodox Church of Antioch, the Chaldean Catholic Church and Protestants. Their language is Assyrian, which also is referred to as Neo-Aramaic, Chaldean and Syriac.

History

The Assyrians are descendants of the ancient Assyrian people who built the empires of Assyria and Babylon in Mesopotamia considered to be ’the Cradle of Civilization’. The Assyrian Empire collapsed in 612 BC. Although living in a predominately Islamic region, the Assyrians are Christians. In the first century they were among the first people to embrace Christians. Isolated from the Christian world the Assyrians came close to losing their identity as a nation.

It was not until the middle of the 19th century that they came into direct contact with the western world and their existence got worldwide attention. Experiencing a cultural renaissance, they built modern schools, colleges and technical institutions in Iran and Iraq during the 19th and 20th centuries. The Assyrians have suffered destructive blows to their existence because of their religion and ethnicity. They fell victim to the wholesale massacres inflicted upon Christians under the Ottoman Empire. Those who escaped the massacres fled their homeland to join the Assyrians living in Iran.

At the end of World War I, the Assyrians were left without any support and no choice but to retreat from Iran in order to reach the British forces in Baghdad. In this long and costly exodus, the Assyrians lost more than two-thirds of their population. In return for loss of their homeland in Hikkari (Turkey) and in compensation for great losses inflicted on them during World War I, Assyrians were promised by Britain, France and Russia a safe and independent homeland.

However, this promise was not fulfilled and Assyrians were again betrayed and left unsupported in a situation that culminated in the massacre of unarmed civilians in Simeil, Iraq in 1933.

From this time on, the Assyrian diaspora began and they fled in all directions as refugees to find a safe haven and protect themselves from total elimination. Prior to the Gulf War more than 400 Assyrian villages were obliterated by the Iraqi government and much of the Assyrian population in the north of Iraq were forcibly transferred to the larger cities such as Bagdad.

The 1991 Gulf war further aggravated the situation of the Assyrians and more than 250,000 Assyrians fled Iraq. The incursion of the Turkish army into northern Iraq in an attempt to end PKK armed activities in 1995 also took its toll on the civilian population including the Assyrians. Since 1996 up to now, the continuous internal fighting between the two parties of Kurds, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) has led to several armed conflicts and general unrest in the region. F

rom the Gulf war until the latest attack in northern Iraq in 1999, more than fifty Assyrian villages have been at least partially occupied by Kurdish forces at gunpoint to relocated the Assyrian population and replace them with a Kurdish population. Sometimes these land expropriations were carried out on the orders of and to the benefit of the leaders of the major Kurdish ethnic groups and political parties. At no time were any of the illegal land expropriations ever reversed or compensation paid by local Kurdish authorities. In this process, many people were kidnapped, tortured, wounded and killed.

Therefore, those people and communities not aligned with either of the two Kurdish groups have lived in fear and intimidation. The Assyrian Universal Alliance (AUA) became a member of UNPO in 1991. The aim of the AUA is to spread, uphold and enhance the Assyrian name in the world and to secure the human rights of the Assyrian people in their homeland.


History of the conflict:

The Assyrian conflict has its origins in their distinct religion and ethnicity that differs from the dominant religion in the region. Although the Iraqi authorities have drafted the constitution in a way that there are no discriminative laws against minorities, discrimination does exist.

According to a special rapporteur of the UN, the numbers of Assyrian representatives in government is relatively small, there is discrimination regarding financial support for education, and they do not have adequate access to the legal system. In the legal system judges frequently apply Islamic law that is very often discriminatory to religious minorities like the Christian Assyrians.

The situation has rapidly deteriorated over the past few years, as control of the area fell into the hands of two competing Kurdish armed factions. Humanitarian aid earmarked for all the inhabitants of the region was completely monopolised by these two-armed factions and served to exacerbate tensions. The ensuing conflict left thousands dead and thousands more wounded.

Specific attacks, reported from 1996 till 1999,against the Assyrian community have included assassinations, kidnappings, land expropriations, and forced conversion to Islam. Since many Assyrian villages have been attacked and occupied by Kurdish armed forces, many Assyrians have lost their properties, fled or lived in fear and insecurity.

Therefore, the first urgent step that needs to be taken is to prevent more loss of life and destruction of property resulting from the ensuing conflicts between ethnic Kurdish groups. Regional autonomous rights, which Assyrian political groups pursue, are to be given to the Assyrian people in the Assyrian homeland. Autonomous regions should have executive and legislative bodies in charge of a police force that will protect Assyrians from violence inflicted on them by the Kurdish factions. It will also prevent the Iraqi government from swaying Assyrian people.

A December 2007 update on the political and human rights situation of the Assyrians in Iraq was published by the Assyria Council of Europe. The report can be downloaded through: http://www.unpo.org/downloads/The_Indigenous_Iraqi_Assyrian.pdf


Organizations:
In 1968 the Assyrian Universal Alliance (AUA) was created: a world-wide organisation seeking to spread, uphold and enhance the Assyrian name in the world, to secure the human rights of the Assyrian people in their homeland and to attain a autonomous state in the Assyrian ancestral homeland. AUA became a Member of the UNPO in 1991.

Statistics:
Population: 3 million
Language: Assyrian
Religion: Christianity