On March 4, Alitalia flight A330 landed at Baghdad International Airport at around 2pm local time. The plane was carrying Pope Francis as he began his apostolic journey to Iraq, a land known as the cradle of many a glorious civilisation, but which now lies in ruin after more than 30 years of war and sanctions, two decades of al-Qaeda terrorist attacks and the recent brutal occupation of large swathes of its territory by ISIS.
For decades, Christians were victims of sectarian wars. Many of them were brutally murdered (among them priests such as Fr Ragheed Ganni, who was a former student of mine at the Angelicum University in Rome), others had to flee their homes in the north and find refuge in Kurdish territory.
Pope Francis’ visit to Iraq highlights the country’s recent history of atrocities against Christians
Since 2003, Iraq has been in a state of insecurity that allows terrorist groups to express their hatred towards religious and ethnic ‘others’. Pope Francis attends a prayer for war victims in Mosul s Old City, Iraq. | Abdullah Rashid/ Reuters
Recording casualties during a conflict can provide a body of evidence of how violence has affected particular communities or groups, such as the Yazidis in Iraq and the Kurds in Syria. When the Islamic State entered Iraq in 2014, they immediately started committing gross human rights violations and displayed violence of an increasingly sectarian nature against religious and ethnic groups, including Christians and Yazidis.
Recording casualties during a conflict can provide a body of evidence of how violence has affected particular communities or groups, such as the Yazidis in Iraq and the Kurds in Syria. When the Islamic State entered Iraq in 2014, they immediately started committing gross human rights violations and displayed violence of an increasingly sectarian nature against religious and ethnic groups, including Christians and Yazidis.
But as Pope Francis makes the first papal visit to Iraq, it’s important to note that violence against Christians in the troubled country had started years earlier – shortly after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein’s regime in 2003. The insecurity that followed the power vacuum enabled extremist elements to form deadly groups – such as al-Qaida in Iraq – to target those that the Iraqi dictator, who had ruled as a secular leader, had been protecting.
Christians in Iraq: The past century in a nutshell
After centuries of Ottoman rule, Iraq emerged as a political unit of its own one hundred years ago. Over the past century, Iraqi Christians have witnessed times of wealth and peaceful coexistence, but they have also had to endure some horrible wars and persecutions.
By Emil Anton
Pope Francis’ Apostolic Journey to Iraq, which kicks off on Friday, coincides with the 100th anniversary of the creation of the Kingdom of Iraq, first under British Administration (1921-1932), then as a sovereign state under the Hashemite King Faisal I and his successors.
Later, the monarchy was overthrown, and after a series of coups, the Republic of Iraq was taken over by the Baath party in 1968, with Saddam Hussein as president from 1979 to 2003.
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