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Since the early 20th century several proposals have been made for the establishment of an autonomous area or an independent state for the Syriac-speaking modern Assyrians in northern Iraq.
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Since the early 20th century several proposals have been made for the establishment of an autonomous area or an independent state for the Syriac-speaking modern Assyrians in northern Iraq.
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Currently,[ when? ] two major Assyrian parties (Assyrian Democratic Movement and Chaldean Syriac Assyrian Popular Council) call for a creation of a 19th governorate which will incorporate Shekhan, Al-Hamdaniya and Tel Keppe districts of Ninawa Governorate. This proposal is pushed by two above mentioned parties as a new governorate for all minorities living there. Various estimates say that new province population will have the following ethno-religious makeup:[ clarification needed ]
During June, 2017, a conference was held in Brussels dubbed, The Future for Christians in Iraq. [5] The conference was organised by the European People's Party and had participants extending from Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac organizations, including representatives from the Iraqi government and the KRG. The conference was boycotted by the Assyrian Democratic Movement, Sons of Mesopotamia, Assyrian Patriotic Party, Chaldean Catholic Church and Assyrian Church of the East. A position paper was signed by the remaining political organizations involved. [6]
Support – The proposal has been backed by the majority of Shia Arabs and Kurdish parties.
Some foreign governments and political parties have also weighed in on the issue:
Oppose – It has been opposed by Sunni Arabs who make up the majority of the city of Mosul.
Some Assyrian organizations also call for a creation of an Assyrian Administrative Region in Northern Iraq, which would include the following districts: [14]
Several Assyrian political parties convened to sign a position paper on the 6th of March 2017 relating to the future of the Nineveh Plains. [15] The position paper called for the creation of a Nineveh Plains province that is self-governed by the Assyrian population of the Nineveh Plain.
Many Kurdish politicians have publicly come out in support of annexing the area to the Kurdistan Regional Government as their fifth governorate (after Dohuk, Erbil and Slemani, and Halabja). Some Assyrians claim Masoud Barzani's KDP is intimidating the population into demanding their region be annexed.[ citation needed ]
Some Assyrian political parties [16] have called for the establishment of an Assyrian-governed Nineveh Plains province as part of the KRG. The province would include the districts of Tel Keppe District, Al-Hamdaniya and Shekhan, and would be governed by the local Assyrian population of the region. Parts of the Nineveh Plain have been illegally annexed and been under the jurisdiction of the KRG and Peshmerga, leading to the inclusion of sections of the Nineveh Plain as a "disputed area" and thus the KRG referendum, 2017 will take place in this occupied territory.[ citation needed ]
On March 5, 2017, three bodies representing Assyrians, Yazidis and Turkmen issued a joint statement calling for a semi-autonomous region in Northern Iraq. The idea was pushed forward by the Turkmen Rescue Foundation, Yazidi Independent Supreme Council and the Al-Rafidain Organization. [17]
The project was proposed in line with Iraq's 2005 Constitution, which gives minorities the right to autonomy or self-administration in sub-units of territory (Chapter 1; Sections 5, 112, 115 and 116).
“The proposal of a region for the minorities is in line with the Iraqi Constitution and doesn’t contradict the general move to share powers and or let minorities manage their own affairs”, said Ali Akram Al-Bayati of the Turkmen Rescue Foundation.
The canton would comprise three continuous regions: Sinjar, Tal Afar and the Nineveh Plain. [18]
Nineveh or Ninawa Governorate is a governorate in northern Iraq. It has an area of 37,323 km2 (14,410 sq mi) and an estimated population of 2,453,000 people as of 2003. Its largest city and provincial capital is Mosul, which lies across the Tigris river from the ruins of ancient Nineveh. Before 1976, it was called Mosul Province and included the present-day Dohuk Governorate. The second largest city is Tal Afar, which has an almost exclusively Turkmen population.
Qaraqosh, Literally meaning Black Bird also known as Al-Hamdaniya or Bakhdida, is an ethnically Assyrian city in Iraq within the Nineveh Governorate, located about 32 km (20 mi) southeast of the city of Mosul and 60 km west of Erbil amid agricultural lands, close to the ruins of the ancient Assyrian cities Kalhu and Nineveh. It is connected to the main city of Mosul by two main roads. The first runs through the Assyrian towns of Bartella and Karamlesh, which connects to the city of Erbil as well. The second, which was gravel before being paved in the 1990s, is direct to Mosul. All of its Assyrian Christian citizens fled to the Kurdistan Region after the ISIS invasion on August 6, 2014. The town was under control of ISIS until October 19, 2016, when it was liberated as part of the Battle of Mosul after which residents have begun to return.
Iraqi Assyrians are an ethnic and linguistic minority group, indigenous to Upper Mesopotamia. Assyrians in Iraq are those Assyrians still residing in the country of Iraq, and those in the Assyrian diaspora who are of Iraqi-Assyrian heritage. They share a common history and ethnic identity, rooted in shared linguistic, cultural and religious traditions, with Assyrians in Iran, Assyrians in Turkey and Assyrians in Syria, as well as with the Assyrian diaspora. Assyrian diaspora in Detroit, Areas with large expat populations include Chicago and Sydney.
The Bet-Nahrain Democratic Party, usually abbreviated as BNDP is an Assyrian political party in Iraq led by Romeo Nissan Hakkari. One of the party's goals is to create an autonomous Assyrian Administrative Region within the Assyrian homeland.
Minorities in Iraq include various ethnic and religious groups.
The Assyrian homeland, Assyria, refers to the homeland of the Assyrian people within which Assyrian civilisation developed, located in their indigenous Upper Mesopotamia. The territory that forms the Assyrian homeland is, similarly to the rest of Mesopotamia, currently divided between present-day Iraq, Turkey, Iran and Syria. In Iran, the Urmia Plain forms a thin margin of the ancestral Assyrian homeland in the north-west, and the only section of the Assyrian homeland beyond the Mesopotamian region. The majority of Assyrians in Iran currently reside in the capital city, Tehran.
Nineveh Plains is a region in Nineveh Governorate in Iraq, to the north and east of the city Mosul. Control over the region is contested between Iraqi security forces, KRG security forces, Assyrian security forces, Babylon Brigade and the Shabak Militia.
Ain Sifni also known as Shekhan, is a town and subdistrict in Nineveh Governorate, Iraq. It is located in the Shekhan District in the Nineveh Plains.
The Christians of Iraq are considered to be one of the oldest continuous Christian communities in the world.
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.
Assyrian politics in Iraq have been taking many different turns since the US invasion of Iraq in 2003. Today, there are many different Assyrian political parties in Iraq. The main Assyrian party that came out from the 2005 elections was the Assyrian Democratic Movement. However, Sarkis Aghajan began to challenge its power beginning in 2006 with the opening of Ishtar TV and the KDP-affiliated Chaldean Syriac Assyrian Popular Council.
Al-Hamdaniya District is a district in the north-east of the Nineveh Governorate (Ninawa) of Iraq.
The Chaldean Syriac Assyrian Popular Council, popularly known as Motwa, is a political party in Iraq, that was founded in 2007, on the initiative of Sarkis Aghajan, a high-ranking member of the Kurdistan Democratic Party. As a party that represents minority communities, CSAPC participated in several elections, both on national, regional and local levels, mainly in various coalitions with other minority parties. The current president of the party is Jameel Zaito.
Tel Keppe is an Assyrian town in northern Iraq. It is located in the Nineveh Governorate, less than 8 mi (13 km) northeast of Mosul.
The disputed territories of northern Iraq are regions defined by article 140 of the Constitution of Iraq as being Arabised during Baath Party rule in Iraq. Most of these regions are inhabited by non-Arabs, including Kurds, Assyrians, Yazidis, Turkmens/Turkomans, and Shabaks.
An independence referendum for the Kurdistan Region of Iraq was held on 25 September 2017, with preliminary results showing approximately 92.73 percent of votes cast in favour of independence. Despite reporting that the independence referendum would be non-binding, the autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) characterised it as binding, although they claimed that an affirmative result would trigger the start of state building and negotiations with Iraq rather than an immediate declaration of independence of Kurdistan. The referendum's legality was rejected by the federal government of Iraq.
The Nineveh Plain Protection Units or NPU is an Assyrian paramilitary organization that was formed in late 2014, largely but not exclusively by Assyrians in Iraq to defend themselves against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). The Nineveh Plains is a region where Assyrians originate from and have lived there for thousands of years.
The Sons of Mesopotamia, also known as Abnaa Al-Nahrain and Bnay Nahrain, is an ethnic Assyrian political party based in northern Iraq. It was founded in 2013, and is headquartered in Erbil, Iraq. Established to further the political objectives of the Assyrian people in Iraq, the party currently holds no seats in the Kurdistan Region Parliament. According to its official website, the party exists as a renewed commitment to the Assyrian national cause, for the betterment of the Assyrian people, and to advance their struggle for legitimate rights in Iraq.
The Nineveh Plain Forces or NPF was a military organization that was formed on 6 January 2015 by the indigenous Christian Assyrian people in Iraq, in cooperation with Peshmerga, to defend against Islamic State. The Nineveh Plains is a region at the heart of the Assyrian homeland. The militia is affiliated with the Bet-Nahrain Democratic Party and the Beth Nahrain Patriotic Union (HBA), the latter being part of the secular Dawronoye movement. It participated in the Battle of Mosul (2016–2017).
The 2018 Assyrian elections in Iraq were the first elections since the Islamic State invasion of Iraq, including the Assyrian heartland, the Nineveh Plains in August 2014. A parliamentary election will be held in Iraq on 12 May 2018. Of the 329 seats in the Iraqi parliament, 5 are reserved for the Christian minorities. The five reserved seats are separated one for each governorate of: Baghdad, Duhok, Erbil, Kirkuk and Nineveh. At the time of voting, only about 200,000 Assyrians remained in the country.
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