Our correspondent from Duhok, Naseem Sadiq met the elected person of the village (Mukhtar) Benyamin Shleemon Brikha, to talk about the recently release of six houses purposely built for the residents to return and resettle in the village with the help of The Assyrian Aid Society-Iraq, The Assyrian Aid Society-USA and The Assyrian Cultural Foundation-USA.
The housing project was named after the late Dr Rowel Giwargis for his generous contribution to the project.
Mr Brikha talked about how the village has been abandoned for over sixty years due to the harsh circumstances in the region.
He said that there are about 450 families from that village that most of them live abroad in Europe, Australia, USA and some fifty families live in Duhok and the rest in Baghdad.
The aim from the project is to encourage the owners to return, resettle and rebuild the village.
your land is you country, history and existence, you should die to protect it Image
Mr Brikha says initially I asked for 10-15 houses to be built, but due to lack of funds, only six were completed. Now six families, who were living in the area are living there.
The village is very close to the warzone between Turkish army and Kurdish rebel forces of PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party). Turkish shelling and bombs are falling two to three hundred meters away from our houses. Many villagers left the area in fear for their life.
As for farming, Mr Brikha says the villagers find it very hard to depend on their harvest to earn a living because at the end of the day, the Kurdistan regional government is importing fruit and vegetables from neighbouring countries like Iran, Turkey and Syria and thy are sold very cheap in the market. Mr Brikha says "Our produce can no longer compete with that market, most of our harvest is sold much cheaper and hardly enough to cover tour expenses".
Mr Brikha says "We are staying in the village not only to farm the land, but to keep it from others who have plans to occupy and take it from it’s Assyrian owners".
He says they will remain in this land and sacrifice as much and as long as they can and will not abandon it or let it to be taken from some greedy Kurdish neighbours. He says, "your land is you country, history and existence, you should die to protect it".
Naseem Sadiq is a regular contributor to SBS Assyrian. He is a journalist and activist in Assyrian matters and lives in Duhok.
