ishtartv.com - catholicculture.org
May
15, 2017
Three
Syriac bishops have called for internationall protection of the Christian
enclaves in northern Iraq, but the Chaldean Catholic Patriarchate of Baghdad
has distanced itself from the plea.
Syriac
Catholic Archbishop Boutros Moshe of Mosul joined with his Syriac Orthodox
counterpart, Archbishop Nicodemus Daud Matti Sharaf, and Orthodox Bishop
Timotheos Musa al Shamany of Bartellah, in a call for UN protection of the
Nineveh Plains, where tens of thousands of Christians fled their homes during
the Islamic State offensive of 2014. Now that the region has been liberated
from the Islamic State, the prelates suggested an autonomous administrative
district under UN protection.
But
the Chaldean Catholic Patriarchate issued a statement indicating that it did
not support the plea. The statement cited the stand taken earlier by Patriarch
Louis Raphael Sako, who said that the top priority at the moment should be for
rebuilding the homes of the villages in the Nineveh Plains. Only after the
Christian families have returned and re-established their lives there, should
administrative questions be raised, he argued.
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