U.S. Strongly Critical of Religious Abuses in Iraq
By contrast, in comparison to the Arab regions of Iraq, the Kurdistan Region is an oasis of harmony and tolerance.
WASHINGTON DC, United States (Kurdistan 24) – On Wednesday, the State Department released its annual report on International Religious Freedom, and it included numerous criticisms of the Baghdad government.
The biggest issue appeared to be the hostile posture of the Shi’a government toward Iraq’s Sunni Arab minority.
In addition, Iraq’s pro-Iranian militias seek to dominate Sinjar and the Nineveh Plains in order to maintain a corridor by which Iran can supply its allies in Syria and Lebanon.
Finally, the smallest minorities, like Baha’i, Christians, Yezidis, and Zoroastrian—faced quite serious discrimination.
By contrast, in comparison to the Arab regions of Iraq, the Kurdistan Region is an oasis of harmony and tolerance.
Iraq’s Population Distribution—Including Religious Discrimination
According to the State Department report, Iraq’s population is 41 million.
Some 1.1 million Iraqis remain in camps for Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs.) Of that number, a significant majority—some 700,000 IDPs—are in camps in the Kurdistan Region.
Muslims are overwhelmingly dominant among the Iraqi population: some 97%. The majority of Iraqis are Shia: some 55-60 percent. Sunni Arabs are 24 percent, and Sunni Kurds constitute 15 percent.
There are less than 150,000 Christians in the country now. That represents a sharp decrease from the estimated 1.5 million Christians living in Iraq before 2003 and the U.S.-led war that overthrew Saddam Hussein’s regime.
Some 500,000 Yezidis live in Nineveh Province and in the Kurdistan Region. Of that number, over 185,000 remain in IDP camps.
Less than 2,000 Bahai live in Iraq. That includes 100 families in the Kurdistan Region. Iraq’s federal law “prohibits the practice of the Baha’i Faith,” the report said, “and provides a penalty of 10 years in prison for anyone convicted of practicing it,” although the law is not enforced.
In the Kurdistan Region, by contrast, the federal law is not only not enforced, but as the report stated, “The KRG (Kurdistan Regional Government) recognizes the Baha’i Faith as a religion.”
According to the report, “Only a handful of Jewish citizens remain in federal Iraq,” and “according to unofficial statistics from the KRG Ministry of Endowments and Religious Affairs (MERA), there are possibly from 100 to 250 Jewish individuals in the IKR [Iraq’s Kurdistan Region.]”
“The KRG falls under the central government’s anti-Israel laws,” the report explained, but it “has its own separate IKR law that provides protections for the rights of members of religious minority groups, including Jews. The KRG MERA dedicates one of its eight departments to Jewish affairs.”
Baghdad’s Discrimination Against Sunni Arabs
Sunni Arabs “represent approximately 90 percent of all prisoners in detention” in federal Iraq, the report says. That includes 9,000 who received death sentences,” while “the government continued to use the antiterrorism law as a pretext for detaining individuals without due process.”
“Some Shia militias, including some operating” under the umbrella of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), “continued to commit physical abuses and were implicated in several attacks on Sunni civilians, allegedly to avenge ISIS crimes against Shias,” the report explained.
The PMF militias “frequently threaten members of Sunni and minority communities with terrorism charges to silence their dissent,” it added, “especially in areas where the militias have taken over local land and economic activities and blocked the return of IDPs.”
Human Rights Violations in the Nineveh Plains and Sinjar
The Nineveh Plains and Sinjar are strategic territory. They control Iran’s route for the resupply of weapons and other materiel to its allies in Syria and Lebanon.
In addition, Sinjar is high ground. In the 1991 war that drove Iraqi forces out of Kuwait, Saddam fired 39 missiles at Israel in what proved to be a failed attempt to divert Arab attention to a war with Israel and away from his own aggression.
Those missiles were fired from Sinjar, and Iran would like to control it, using pro-Iranian elements within Iraq. That has resulted in a period of extended instability and significantly limited the ability of the Yezidis to return home.
“Only a very small number” of Iraq’s Yezidi population have returned to their homes, “with Sinjar having an estimated return rate of only 35 percent, including non-Yezidis,” the report explained.
The 30th and 50th PMF Brigades operate in the Nineveh Plains. “There were numerous reports” of the involvement of both units “in extortion, illegal arrests, kidnappings and detention of individuals without warrants,” it said.
“Informed observers reported the 30th PMF Brigade continued to operate secret detention facilities in several locations in Nineveh Province, which held unknown numbers of detainees arrested on sectarian-based and reportedly false pretenses,” it added.
The report noted, pointedly, that Yezidi representatives had complained that “Iran-aligned militias maintained private real estate offices to buy Yezidi and Arab Sunni real estate and properties in order to change the demography of the Sinjar district in favor of Shia.”
Discrimination Against Christians
Among the more notable examples of discrimination against other religious minorities was the revocation of the standing of Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako as Patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church in Iraq.
That happened on July 3, 2023, and was done under the authority of Iraqi President, Latif Rashid, who assumed the post in 2022. Rashid is a long-time member of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), which has held the position of Iraqi president since Saddam’s overthrow.
In 2013, a presidential decree was issued recognizing Cardinal Sako’s status, but Rashid revoked that decision. He claimed, as the report said, that he had “made the decision in order to correct a constitutional error since the president has no right to appoint or recognize religious leaders.”
However, the State Department cast doubt on Rashid’s explanation, noting that he “did not revoke the decrees related to any other religious leaders at that time.”
Indeed, the report quotes Cardinal Sako as offering a more likely explanation. Sako called Rashid’s decision “unprecedented” and “unfair,” charging that Rashid “was targeting him, and the decision was part of the PMF 50th Brigade Commander al-Kildani’s efforts to usurp his authority and gain control of church offices and assets.”
Since at that time, Rashid stuck by that position, Cardinal Sako moved from Baghdad to Erbil.
Read More: U.S. Slams Baghdad for Mistreatment of Catholic Leader; Welcomed in the Kurdistan Region
Most recently, however, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani has reversed Rashid’s dubious decision. Earlier this month, he signed a decree reinstating Cardinal Sako as head of the Chaldean church.
As he reassumed his work in Baghdad, the Cardinal warmly thanked the KRG leadership for its support, including its tolerance toward Christianity and other religions.
Read More: Chaldean Patriarch commends Kurdistan Region's leadership's efforts for unity, stability
