{"id":8545,"date":"2011-10-12T16:15:57","date_gmt":"2011-10-12T20:15:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/?p=8545"},"modified":"2011-10-12T17:19:39","modified_gmt":"2011-10-12T21:19:39","slug":"iraqs-kurds-offer-homes-to-refugee-christians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2011\/10\/iraqs-kurds-offer-homes-to-refugee-christians","title":{"rendered":"Iraq’s Kurds offer homes to refugee Christians"},"content":{"rendered":"

Iraq’s Kurdish\u00a0minority\u00a0is offering\u00a0homes to refugee Christians who have been driven out of southern Iraq and Baghdad\u00a0by Islamist extremists.<\/p>\n

Aboout 30 million Kurds\u00a0inhabit a region historically known as Kurdistan which\u00a0crosses the borders of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey. About 4 million of Iraq’s 34 million citizens are Kurds.<\/p>\n

Targeted by Saddam Hussein, who used chemical warfare to kill entire villages, Iraqi Kurds have enjoyed semi-autonomy since the first Gulf war in 1991. Now the predominant Kurdish political party, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, is offering homes to Christian refugees who will move into one of those villages, according to the British-based Institute for War and Peace Reporting<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Refugees are being offered plots of land\u00a0as well as\u00a0$10,000 per family\u00a0to settle in the village of Se Ganian, whose population was murdered by poison gas\u00a0during Saddam’s campaign against the Kurds.<\/p>\n

In the last decade, more than 200,000 Iraqi Christians have left Iraq after such incidents as the October 2010 attack on\u00a0a packed Baghdad church — which\u00a0killed\u00a0more than\u00a060 men, women and children.<\/p>\n

Only about\u00a0200,000 Chaldean Christians remain in Iraq, according to Louis Sago, archbishop of the Chaldean\u00a0Orthodox Church\u00a0in Kirkuk, who says 12,000 have settled in the Kirkuk area.<\/p>\n

Mohammad Ameen, a political analyst and a professor at Kirkuk University, discounted the initiative “a political move to get more votes.” The oil-rich, multi-ethnic Kirkuk\u00a0area\u00a0is debating whether to vote to\u00a0become part of the\u00a0Kurdistan political area within Iraq. The Kurds are predominantly Muslim.<\/p>\n

Kurdish spokesman Ghafoor Salih Sameen said his party would do all that was required to safeguard Iraq\u2019s Christians and halt their exodus. \u201cThis is not the first time the\u00a0[Kurdish party]\u00a0has supported the Christians, considering them a part of our history,\u201d he said. \u201cWe are working hard to serve Kirkuk residents in general and the Christians in particular as they are an important part of the identity of Kirkuk.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Iraq’s Kurdish\u00a0minority\u00a0is offering\u00a0homes to refugee Christians who have been driven out of southern Iraq and Baghdad\u00a0by Islamist extremists. Aboout 30 million Kurds\u00a0inhabit a region historically known as Kurdistan which\u00a0crosses the borders of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey. About 4 million of Iraq’s 34 million citizens are Kurds. Targeted by Saddam Hussein, who used chemical warfare…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":270,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[32,55],"tags":[2204,2208,1733,1732],"class_list":["post-8545","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christian","category-islam","tag-christian","tag-islam","tag-kirkuk","tag-kurdistan"],"yoast_head":"\nIraq's Kurds offer homes to refugee Christians<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2011\/10\/iraqs-kurds-offer-homes-to-refugee-christians\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Iraq's Kurds offer homes to refugee Christians\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Iraq’s Kurdish\u00a0minority\u00a0is offering\u00a0homes to refugee Christians who have been driven out of southern Iraq and Baghdad\u00a0by Islamist extremists. 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Targeted by Saddam Hussein, who used chemical warfare…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2011\/10\/iraqs-kurds-offer-homes-to-refugee-christians\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Beliefnet News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-10-12T20:15:57+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2011-10-12T21:19:39+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Iraq's Kurds offer homes to refugee Christians","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2011\/10\/iraqs-kurds-offer-homes-to-refugee-christians","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Iraq's Kurds offer homes to refugee Christians","og_description":"Iraq’s Kurdish\u00a0minority\u00a0is offering\u00a0homes to refugee Christians who have been driven out of southern Iraq and Baghdad\u00a0by Islamist extremists. 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