Report on the General Conference in Baghdad of Chaldeans, Syriacs, and Assyrians (24/10/2003)

The Plenary Session, convened in the main hall of the heavily guarded Sheraton hotel, attracted a very large crowd of mainly Assyrians and Chaldeans, as well Syriacs from Syria and Lebanon, and members of Mtakasta (ADO), who have been very active in planning this conference and taking responsibility of the many tasks of the secretariat headed by Mr. Yonan Hozaiya, one of the five members of the political bureau of the Central Committee of the ADO.  The level of cooperation was admirable and as one participant remarked, ” the reason that our community members were not picking on each other as often happens, but rather engaging in discussion to resolve differences of opinion was that we feel empowered for the first time to be in charge of our destiny.  We can no longer live in a victim mentality.  We hold our fate in our hands.”

The Plenary Session

The prodeedings began with a session in which speeches were made not just by Ambassador Patrick Kennedy, who was representing Mr. Bremer (at the time attending the donor’s conference in Madrid), but also by the representative of Mr. Iyad Alawi, who for October is the presiding member of the Iraqi Governing Council.  Additional speeches were made by the papal representative in Baghdad, Shlemon Warduni, Mr. Saad Yildiz of the ADO in Sweden, Mr. Habib Afram, one of the leading writers on Christians in the Middle East, as well as Mr. Imad Sham’un who had come with the blessings of the Maronite Patriarch.

At this formal session, very crowded with media (including Reuters and LBC, Fox and others), there were security from at least three groups: first and foremost, the ZOWAA armed men, then Americans guarding Amb. Kennedy, and finally guards from the Iraqi Governing Council.  The media kept urging the guards to move out of camera vision but at times with little success. Most of us who had not been close to arms at any range found the experience surreal as was certainly an Assyrian meeting in Baghdad.

The pattern of speeches was interrupted by a young people’s choir singing two patriotic Assyrian songs, and a modern dance group which, despite the small stage, performed a synchronized dance. 

At the end of the plenary, the audience was treated to a varied and colorful presentation of costumes from many villages of the Nineveh plain, organized by the Assyrian Women’s Union, for which they had borrowed old costumes which were modeled by young women.  The MC for this part of the program was Jean d’Arc Hozaya.

Photographs of these costumes should be available on the internet soon. In the spirit of the conference, the costumed girls at the end rallied around a girl from  whose arm hung a large Assyrian flag.

The Debate

The following two days were spent on discussing language issues, history and politics. Most presentations were done in Arabic, but a lot of the discussion was in our own language spoken in many dialects.  The delegation from Iran was fortunate in having someone translating much of the Arabic into our own language.  Most of the other attendees, even those from Abroad, understood Arabic since they were originally from Iraq or Syria.

Mr. Sam Yono made a special multi-language presentation during his chairing of tone of the panels in which he pointed to the realization of the problem of achieving unity and recognition that has emerged over the past decade. Although clearly many people who agreed to discuss this issue have some uneasiness with how to proceed, how to accommodate the various parts of our nation, none can evade the problem for us in Iraq if we do not come to a meeting of the minds, at least in Iraq.  Speaker after speaker, especially the representative of Furqono  and the representative of the Atranaye Political Party pointed to the various aspect of the problem of our name.  Everyone was aware of the role of our churches and speakers called for separation of church and state.

The Constitution of a New Iraq

One of the most substantive presentations was made by Prof. Hikmat Hakim, a professor of Public Law, who sits on the committee to organize the procedure for the drafting of the constitution.  The committee that actually drafts the constitution will be selected. The committee on which he sits is composed of 25 members, reflecting the exact ethno-religious make-up of the IGC. He is from Telkepe and made three things very clear: 

– the American recommended timeframe (12/15/03) may be hard to meet, even for the formation of the constitutional committee
– the direction for the constitution will come from the deliberations of the IGC which thus far have provided the following:
– that Iraq will have a plural, democratic constitution… that the role of Islam in the constitution will be guided by the following carefully worded stand, the constitution will honor the Islamic identity of the majority of the Iraqi people.  This represents a compromise between those who want Shari’a and those who do not want an Islamic state.
– there will probably a great deal of continued debate on the ethnic question and the tendency is to drop mention of ANY ethnic groups, including Arabs and Kurds.

The Resolutions of the General Conference

At the end of the third day of conference, the secretariate drafted resolutions which were discussed by the general body of attendees and, b ased on these discussions, they were ammended and formalized. The Arabic version was later published in the special conference issue of BAHRA for the week of 26 October. The following is an informal English language summary of the main points:

-Unity of Iraq
-Federal, plural, democratic  system of governance
-Respect for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
-The denominations of our community (Chaldean, Syriac, Assyrian) belong to one entity and represent historical context of our people throughout our long history in our homeland to which we are attached.
-In view of the situation in Iraq, the term ChaldoAssyrian will be used and the language designation will be Syriac
-The constitution must recognize the national existence of the Chaldo-Assyrians, as the indigenous people of Iraq
-An administrative region for ChaldoAssyrians on the plains of Nineveh as well as special provisions for other members of our community living in other areas.
-Laws which treat the injustices done to our people, in particular those leading to demographic changes since 1957 census and before.
-The right of return for those who emigrated or were forced to do so
-Rights of ChaldoAssyrian women
-Call of members of our community in Diaspora to exercise national responsibility in the reconstruction of Iraq.
-Appeal to parties and organizations to continue the beneficial dialogue in which we are engaged with a view to preserving our unity
-Establish a general secretariat to set up committees for carrying out decisions of the general conference.

Conclusions

The conference closed with much good will and hope that the spirit of cooperation would continue.  At a future date, when the security situation is even better, other such meetings can take place when more of the people in Diaspora can participate and come to appreciate the place that the twenty years of hard work and personal sacrifice have earned for us all.

The final events were a play which traced the historical position of our people from our origins in Mesopotamia through to the years of foreign conquest, the “clowns” at the Paris Peace Conference who denied us our rights, the years of egotistic leaders (“ANA, Ana, ana” sayers) who destroyed our unity, and  the  terrifying years of Saddam Hussein. One unfortunate event did take place, the actor playing Saddam Hussein accidentally; cut a member of the audience with the sword he was brandishing so realistically!  Would that Saddam Hussein could be so apologetic for all the blood he shed.

The art exhibition some of which represented the spirit of our history and culture, and others village scenes by a group of artistic men and women, topped the days of thoughts and actions devoted to improving the future of our people.  Much thanks goes to the organizers, especially the Zowaa Demokrataya Athuraya which
conducted the on the ground logistics of pick-up, delivery and security. . Less happy were many of us from abroad with the belly trouble we developed at that appropriately named hotel Babylon, which, though run down as much of Baghdad is now, might have prevented our Baghdad Bellies with a more careful use of bottled
water.

This was a historic, courageous and heroic event. It needs to be discussed in light of history, in light of the possibilities for the future while avoiding the pitfalls of ego, rumor, and extremism. Let us hope that next time, we can all accept the invitation of Dr. Donny George Youkhana, one of the enthusiastic attendees, to see the
Assyrian treasures at the Baghdad Museum.  Next year in Baghdad?