Tag: Iraq

US aid to Middle East will fund faith groups before ‘ineffective’ UN

October 26, 2017 Global News -- No Particular Country Barack Obama, Iraq, Middle East, Mike Pence, Nineveh Plains, Peshmerga, Syria, Tel Skuf, USA

The United States’ Vice President Mike Pence has announced that its State Department will favour “faith-based groups” and the US Agency for International Development over “ineffective” UN relief efforts, reports The Independent. Pence made the announcement as keynote speaker at the annual dinner of a Washington-based advocacy NGO In Defense . . . Read More

Christians who fled IS displaced again as Iraqi and Kurdish forces clash

October 25, 2017 Iraq Alqosh, Bashiqa, Dohuk, IDPs, Iraq, Islamic State, Kurds, Nineveh Plains, Peshmerga, Tel Skuf

Fighting has erupted between Iraqi and Kurdish forces in a predominantly Christian town in northern Iraq, causing residents to flee. Around 900 families have fled Telskuf and its surrounding villages – part of the Nineveh Plains region of northern Iraq liberated last year from the Islamic State group – to . . . Read More

Qatar conference: ‘no peace in Middle East without democracy and rule of law’

October 25, 2017 Arabian Peninsula, Arabs, Copts, Doha, Egypt, Iraq, Middle East, Minorities, Qatar

A two-day conference in Qatar earlier this week focused on the plight of Arab Christians and the threats they face through wars and conflicts in the Middle East, recognising there is “no magic wand” to deal with inter-religious and sectarian strife. Bomb attacks on Coptic churches in Egypt and forced . . . Read More

Christians on alert as Iraqi forces take over Nineveh Plains

October 18, 2017 Iraq Bartella, Bashiqa, Iraq, Islamic State, Nineveh Plains, Peshmerga, Saddam Hussein

Christian returnees have lunch together in Bashiqa, August 2017. (Photo: World Watch Monitor)

Christians who have returned to the Nineveh Plains in northern Iraq, three years after fleeing Islamic State militants, are on high alert now Iraqi forces have retaken some of the disputed region from Kurdish forces. Father Poulos, one of the priests in the town of Bashiqa, near Mosul, told World . . . Read More

UN ‘overlooked’ IS crime of forced displacement

October 17, 2017 Global News -- No Particular Country Genocide, Iraq, Islamic State, Middle East, Rex Tillerson, Syria, UN, Yazidis

Iraqi Christians ask the international community for help as they are facing annihilation by Islamic State. (Photo: World Watch Monitor)

Campaigners for Christian and Yazidi victims of the Islamic State group welcomed the UN’s decision last month to recognise the Islamic State group’s crimes as “genocide”, but human rights advocate Ewelina Ochab questions why “forced displacement” wasn’t included. The UN Security Council voted unanimously to create an investigative team to . . . Read More

Iraqi-Kurdish violence could push Christians who survived IS ‘to flee for good’

October 17, 2017 Iraq Erbil, Iraq, Islamic State, Karamles, Kurds, Nineveh Plains, Peshmerga, Syria

Fresh large-scale fighting in the disputed territory between Iraq and its Kurdish region could further drain the region of Christians – only months after the military defeat of Islamic State persuaded some to return to their homes, experts have warned. Small numbers of Iraqi Christians are gradually returning to the towns . . . Read More

Hungary’s response to urgent need to help persecuted Christians ‘stay in their homelands’

October 13, 2017 Global News -- No Particular Country Ankawa, Ayatollah Khomeini, Bartella, Erbil, Genocide, Hungary, Iran, Iraq, Kurds, Middle East, Nineveh Plains, Qaraqosh, Soviet Union, Syria, Tel Skuf, Viktor Orbán

Referring to his country’s experience of oppression during the Soviet Union era, the Hungarian Prime Minister has once again explained why his government has been the first – and so far the only – government to specifically address the persecution of Christians around the world. Yesterday (12 October) he pledged . . . Read More

Christians returning to former IS-occupied Karamles ‘increasing day to day’

October 12, 2017 Iraq Chaldeans, Iraq, Islamic State, Karamles, Kurds, Mosul, Nineveh Plains

It’s been a year since Karamles was liberated from Islamic State group (IS) militants. It was one of the Nineveh Plains towns east of Mosul that fell to IS as it advanced across northern Iraq in August 2014. The occupation forced Christian families to flee for safer cities like Erbil, . . . Read More

Iraq: today’s vote on Kurdish independence is troubling the Middle East

September 25, 2017 Iraq Elections, Iraq, Islamic State, Kirkuk, Kurds, Middle East, Nineveh Plains, Yazidis

Iraq’s Kurds went to the polls today (25 September) to vote on whether to become a new state, independent of Iraq. According to Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty (RFERL) the vast majority will have voted “yes” to the question on the ballot paper: “Do you want the Kurdistan region and . . . Read More

‘Milestone’ as UN votes to create team to collect evidence of IS’s crimes

September 22, 2017 Global News -- No Particular Country Antonio Guterres, Genocide, Iraq, Islamic State, Jan Figel, Lord Alton, Middle East, Rex Tillerson, Syria, UN, Yazidis

Desecrated church I in Qaraqosh, Iraq. (Photo: World Watch Monitor)

Campaigners for Christian and Yazidi victims of the Islamic State group welcomed a vote at the United Nations yesterday (21 September), hailed as a “milestone” in their efforts to bring perpetrators of atrocities to justice. The UN Security Council voted unanimously to create an investigative team to collect evidence of . . . Read More

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