Mosul – More than 1400 Christian families have already returned to their homes and villages scattered in the Nineveh Plain, which they abandoned in the summer of 2014, due to the advance of the jihadist militia of the self-proclaimed Islamic State (Daesh). This is what Nawfal al Akoub, current governor of the Nineveh Province declared, who in some statements relauched by the local press announced a further, significant increase of families in the coming weeks.
Most of the families involved in this counter-exodus – the governor explained – had found refuge in Iraqi Kurdistan, and their return proceeds in parallel with the refurbishing of homes and networks of electric and plumbing services in towns and villages (such as Bartella, Qaraqosh, Karmles and Teleskof) from where they had been forced to flee.
The news of a consistent return of Christians in the Nineveh Plain is also indirectly confirmed by the provisions on the suspension of housing programs that have been put in place in Iraq’s Kurdistan since 2014 by the Chaldean Archdiocese of Erbil to help displaced people from the areas fallen under the control of the Islamic State. The suspension of emergency rescue programs began already in July, and data is now being published that give the magnitude of the size of the rescue operation implemented by ecclesiastical structures and institutions. Committee and reception program leaders – report ankawa.com online headlines – say that they have financially supported the first aid and accommodation of 2423 households. At least $ 11 million were spent on housing, health and food programs, which lasted 27 months, and all cash payments to individual households are adequately reported. The leaders of the reception and rescue committee point out the Knights of Colombo and the Italian Bishops’ Conference among the main advocates of the programs put in place to assist Christian refugees from the Nineveh Plain.
Source: Fides News
