| Total population | |
|---|---|
| 6,024 Iraq-born [1] | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Wellington, Auckland | |
| Languages | |
| New Zealand English and Iraqi Arabic also Kurdish (Sorani and Kurmanji dialects), Turkish (Iraqi Turkmen/Turkoman dialects), Neo-Aramaic (Chaldean, Ashuri, and Mandaic), and Hebrew | |
| Religion | |
| Predominantly Christianity (mostly Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholic) and Islam Minority: Judaism and Mandaeism | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Arabs, Armenians, Assyrians, Azerbaijanis, Iranians, Mizrahi Jews, Turks, Mandaeans Some descendants of New Zealanders |
Iraqi New Zealanders constitute a small population immigrants from Iraq and New Zealand-born people of Iraqi heritage or descent.
The 2006 census found that 6024 New Zealanders were born in Iraq, although the figure of Iraqi New Zealanders will be higher than this as many New Zealand-born children of Iraqis may consider themselves to be Iraqi New Zealanders. The majority of Iraqi New Zealanders came to New Zealand as skilled migrants during the 1990s and many were Assyrian Christians who had been persecuted for their religion. The greatest concentrations of Iraqis are in Auckland and Wellington. [2]
Many Iraqi Christians (predominantly ethnic Assyrians belonging to the Chaldean Catholic, Syriac Catholic, Syriac Orthodox and Protestant churches) live in the North Shore region of Auckland city. These are mainly highly educated Maslawi Assyrian Christians who were from Baghdad, the capital of Iraq, and Basra city in the south of Iraq, but originally heiling from Mosul, a city in northern Iraq. They came under the skilled migrant point system category in the mid 1990s. Many of these have settled in the Unsworth Heights and Albany suburbs. The North Shore Iraqi community is one of the fastest growing middle eastern communities in New Zealand. Many Iraqi immigrants had trouble working in their professional fields as there was a lack of employment during the early 1990s; however, by the late 2000s, many had established their own private businesses from private medical clinics to industrial firms.
The demographics of New Zealand encompass the gender, ethnic, religious, geographic, and economic backgrounds of the 5.1 million people living in New Zealand. New Zealanders predominantly live in urban areas on the North Island. The five largest cities are Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, Hamilton, and Tauranga. Few New Zealanders live on New Zealand's smaller islands. Waiheke Island is easily the most populated smaller island with 9,420 residents, while Great Barrier Island, the Chatham and Pitt Islands, and Stewart Island each have populations below 1,000. New Zealand is part of a realm and most people born in the realm's external territories of Tokelau, the Ross Dependency, the Cook Islands and Niue are entitled to New Zealand passports.
Assyrians are an indigenous ethnic group native to Mesopotamia, a geographical region in West Asia. Modern Assyrians descend from Ancient Mesopotamians such as ancient Assyrians and Babylonians, originating from the ancient indigenous Mesopotamians of Akkad and Sumer, who first developed the civilisation in northern Mesopotamia that would become Assyria in 2600 BCE. Modern Assyrians may culturally self-identify as Syriacs, Chaldeans, or Arameans for religious, geographic, and tribal identification.
Islam in New Zealand is a religious affiliation representing about 1.3% of the total population. Small numbers of Muslim immigrants from South Asia and eastern Europe settled in New Zealand from the early 1900s until the 1960s. Large-scale Muslim immigration began in the 1970s with the arrival of Fiji Indians, followed in the 1990s by refugees from various war-torn countries.
The Assyrian diaspora refers to ethnic Assyrians living in communities outside their ancestral homeland. The Eastern Aramaic-speaking Assyrians claim descent from the ancient Assyrians and are one of the few ancient Semitic ethnicities in the Near East who resisted Arabization, Turkification, Persianization and Islamization during and after the Muslim conquest of Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey.
Chinese New Zealanders or Sino-New Zealanders are New Zealanders of Chinese ancestry. The largest subset of Asian New Zealanders, many of the Chinese immigrants came from Mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, or other countries that have large populations of Chinese diaspora. Today's Chinese New Zealand group is also composed of diasporic communities from Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia, Vietnam and Singapore. As of 2018, Chinese New Zealanders account for 4.9% of the population of New Zealand, and are the largest Asian ethnic group in New Zealand, accounting for 36.3% of Asian New Zealanders.
Migration to New Zealand began with Polynesian settlement in New Zealand, then uninhabited, about 1250 to 1280. European migration provided a major influx following the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840. Subsequent immigration has been chiefly from the British Isles, but also from continental Europe, the Pacific, the Americas and Asia.
The Christians of Iraq are considered to be one of the oldest continuous Christian communities in the world.
British Assyrians are British people of Assyrian descent or Assyrians who have British citizenship.
Assyrian nationalism is a movement of the Assyrian people that advocates for independence or autonomy within the regions they inhabit in northern Iraq, northeastern Syria, northwestern Iran, and southeastern Turkey.
Iraqi Canadians are Canadians of full or partial Iraqi descent, as well as people from the state of Iraq who are ethno-linguistic and religious minorities. According to the 2011 Census there were 49,680 Canadians of Iraqi ancestry, an increase compared to the 2006 Census.
Christianity, which originated in the Middle East during the 1st century AD, is a significant minority religion within the region, characterized by the diversity of its beliefs and traditions, compared to Christianity in other parts of the Old World. Christians now make up approximately 5% of the Middle Eastern population, down from 13% in the early 20th century. Cyprus is the only Christian majority country in the Middle East, with Christians forming between 76% and 78% of the country's total population, most of them adhering to Eastern Orthodox Christianity. Lebanon has the second highest proportion of Christians in the Middle East, around 40%, predominantly Maronites. Egypt has the next largest proportion of Christians, at around 10% of its total population. Copts, numbering around 10 million, constitute the single largest Christian community in the Middle East.
New Zealanders of African descent represent less than 0.3% of New Zealand's population, although the number has been growing substantially since the 1990s.
Toi whakairo or just whakairo (carving) is a Māori traditional art of carving in wood, stone or bone.
Iranian New Zealanders, informally known as Persian Kiwis, are New Zealanders of Iranian national background or descent who are expatriates or permanent immigrants, and their descendants. The 2006 census found that 2,895 New Zealanders were born in Iran, although the figure of Iranian New Zealanders will be higher than this as many of them are born in another country.
Japanese New Zealanders are New Zealand citizens of Japanese ancestry, which may include Japanese immigrants and descendants born in New Zealand. Japanese people first began immigrating to New Zealand in the 1890s. Until 1920, 14 Japanese citizens resided in New Zealand. Japanese immigration was halted during the period of the Pacific War and recommenced around the 1950s. From this period onwards, Japanese immigration remained small until the 1990s. In 1997, Japanese peoples were the 19th-largest ethnic group in New Zealand. As of the 2018 census, 18,141 New Zealand residents identify themselves as Japanese New Zealanders.
Arab New Zealanders refers to people from Arab countries, particularly Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Iraq, and Jordan and also small groups from Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Libya, Yemen and Sudan, who emigrated from their native nations and currently reside in New Zealand. The term also refers to descendants of diasporic Arabians such as descendants of Arab merchants to Asian nations, whose ancestral origins may be traced to merchants hailing from the Southern Arabian nations such as Yemen and Oman and the Arab nations of the Persian gulf region. Most Arab New Zealanders are of Lebanese and Iraqi descent because they were the first Arabs to arrive in New Zealand. Therefore, an Arab New Zealander is a New Zealander of Arab cultural and linguistic heritage or identity whose ancestry traces back to any of various waves of immigrants originating from one or more of the twenty countries comprised by the Arab world.
The term Irish New Zealander refers to New Zealanders of full or partial Irish ancestry. This includes Irish immigrants as well as New Zealanders of Irish descent. The term makes no distinction concerning religion and encompasses both Catholic and Protestant immigrants and their descendants; nonetheless, the chief criterion of distinction between Irish immigrants, especially those who arrived in the nineteenth century, is religion.
Lebanese New Zealanders refers to citizens or permanent residents of New Zealand of Lebanese ancestry. The community is diverse, having a large Christian religious base, being mostly Maronite Catholics and Greek Orthodox, while also having a small Muslim group of both the Shia and Sunni branches of Islam.
Assyrians in New Zealand are New Zealanders of Assyrian descent or Assyrians who have New Zealand citizenship. The Assyrian community in New Zealand began in the 1990s when refugees from Iraq and Iran settled in the country.
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