The German journalist and researcher Susanne Güsten was one of the guests invited to the Assyrian Convention in Gothenburg. She gave a lecture on her latest report for the Sabanci University in Istanbul about the return of the Assyrians to Turabdin. The report is titled “A farewell to Turabdin” and present huge difficulties the Assyrians are facing, especially the land grab by the Turkish state and the Kurds. What is not known to the outside world is that the Kurdish National movement is part of this confiscation, in order to Kurdify the Assyrian regions in Turkey, Syria and Iraq. In this interview she points out the Kurdifikation policy as a historic tradition of Muslim ruling over non-Muslims (Milleti-Hakime). Besides the Nationalistic Kurdish project to create a pure Kurdish rule on Assyrian land, the Kurds are as Muslims as Turks, she says. Yesterday’s oppressed minority is now oppressing the indigenous people and I fear the day the Assyrians will come under Kurdish rule, Güsten concludes.

She is now living in Washington, after 20 years in Istanbul. She has been following the return of the Assyrians from when it began at 2001 till now. She thinks this is the last opportunity for the last generation rooted in Turabdin to return home. But she is aware of the fact that Assyrians are still hoping.