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Three years have passed since our Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac people were forcibly driven out of their ancestral lands in the Nineveh Plains, when they were directly targeted and subjected to genocide by ISIS. Three years have passed and our people’s situation continious to deteriorate because of the central government of Iraq and the human rights organisations ignored our plight and our aspirations for a life of dignity and offered us food-baskets instead.
We have lost all hope and endurance since we do not see a beacon of hope shining through our current misery. Thus we can’t call our ancient and indigenous people, the creators of human civilisation in Babylon and Assyria, to continue enduring and holding to their land which they have rightfully inherited through millennia.

Therefore, we call for the European Union to take urgent steps and actions to fulfil the below listed demands of our people, the victims of ISIS terror:

1. We demand that the Nineveh Plains dragged into any political and/or military conflicts between all the internal, regional and international powers; and ensuring that the Nineveh Plains and its people stay neutral with concern to these internal and external conflicts. With the noble hope of securing the safe return of our wretched people to their lands and homes in the Nineveh Plains.

2. To recognise the rights of our indigenous people to establish a self administered region in the Nineveh Plains or an autonomy linked to the central government under the condition that a state budget is allocated for it.

3. We strongly reiterate that the continuous migration of of our people shall lead to this country’s loss of one of its religiously and ethnically indigenous components. If the current situation continues, it would be impossible for us to holt this migration which will damage the demographic structure and the population spread in the area. Here we would also like to draw your attention to article 1 of the Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities of 1992.

4. Despite all the aid assistance granted for the internally displaced refugees through the central government, the KRG and the churches, but no more than a very small percentage of this aid has made it to the people. Therefore, on the principle of collaborating with the people directly and incorporating them in to this process, we demand that urgent monetary funds be granted directly to the internally and externally displaced refugees.

5. In accordance with the Security Council’s resolution of 2250, which calls to enable the youth to meaningfully participate in creating peace and security, we therefore call for the establishment of a crises group led by alert, enlightened and independent youth from the civil societies and directly from the refugees themselves: so they can turn move forward under the local government and international laws.

6. We demand that the EU establishes an international fund to rebuild the infrastructure of the effected areas and the reparation of thousands of people who were subjected to genocide by ISIS. We also demand you apply pressure on the central government to initiate an annual budget as part of its central budget to rebuilt the area and compensate the people of the effected areas in the forthcoming years.

7. To unify all of the Christian forces under the administration of Iraqi and European experts and advisors and for the EU to arm this unified force accordingly. Furthermore, this unified force should be distanced from all party politics.

We sincerely hope that our demands receives your attention and support.

Sincerely Yours,
The Committee of Nineveh Plain’s Youth Activists.