Later on, a fifth panel composed of Church leaders is supported by Johny Messo of the “Arameans” (Syriacs). The sectarian Arameanist movement Jonny Messo represents as current leader of the ‘World Council of Arameans’ (WCA) finds its roots in the manipulations of the bishop Julius Hanna, who here describes how he was motivated to fabricate the Aramean identity due to his disdain for the intellectual and social authority the secular Assyrian movement established across church boundaries in diaspora. Remarkably, he was later assaulted by Arameanists furious over these disclosures.

The Arameanist movement has no roots in the Middle East. It is crucial to note that the very recent tokenistic representation on the ground in Nineveh of Aramean/Syriac sectarianism has taken the form of the KDP-led establishment of a ‘Syriac’ military force and political party attached to the Dawronoye (whose tentacle, the European Syriac Union, is taking part in this conference too) under the control of the charlatan Salwan Momika. The most significant contribution of the ‘Syriac Democratic Union’ to Assyrian (or Iraqi) affairs thus far has been throwing a shoe at Yonadam Kanna.

The WCA issued a ‘statement’ upon the passing in 2015 of Mar Dinkha, Patriarch of the Church of the East, which concisely illustrates the combination of political and national passivity, sectarian rhetoric, and calumny that alone defines their output. Within the space of this short text, the WCA managed to cram fabricated hearsay, libel, sectarianism, a celebration of the failure of Assyrian independence, and a reduction of the Assyrian nation to an adjunct of Arab and Turkish politics. The fact that the WCA capitalized on the death of Mar Dinkha to publish such a text reflects their parasitic attachment to the Assyrian movement, the hatred of which forms the very essence of Arameanism.

While the intellectual basis of Aramean nationalism ostensibly encompasses Assyrians of all denominations, the WCA has consistently sought to place itself at the feet of the Syriac Orthodox Church, in full cognizance that it is only under the auspices of the SOC that Arameanism stands even a chance of ‘success’. (‘Success’ for the WCA can be defined by the dissemination of a series of pseudo-national tokens and trinkets, like Aramean currency and ID cards, and using the momentum created by the Assyrian movement to ‘convert’ Assyrians of the SOC into self-hatred and delusion.)

Unfortunately for Messo, Mor Ignatius Aphrem II, the current Syriac Orthodox Patriarch, is far too wily a character to hand over the entire identity and orientation of his church to a fringe movement with nothing to offer bar the rancour of sectarian idiocy. This has left them in a desperate position. Given that the only legitimacy of the WCA is derived from their observer status at the UN and showing up to EU meetings carrying an air of urgency and seriousness (while representing no-one and nothing), their eagerness for involvement in this conference is unsurprising. Nor is the fact they were invited: their presence is a perfect way for those Assyrians and non-Assyrians involved in ‘the Assyrian question as foreign determination’ to point to their status as ‘neutral arbiters’ of the ‘divided Assyrian people’, while in fact obfuscating the truth of the plight and needs of Assyrians on the ground.

While these figures advance themselves politically by establishing their position as altruists seeking to ‘give a voice to Assyrians’ and ‘present the Assyrian case to the world’ (by jockeying for a place as the ‘Christian legitimizers’ of the KDP conquest of Nineveh) they can pretend that it was the failures within the Assyrian nation (so native, so angry) that led to our own self-destruction, pointing to the KDP-ventriloquised Assyrian forces as evidence that subjugation represents at least the partial will of Assyrians, and positing a diversity of political voices as a sign of democratic progress.

Moving on to the sixth panel, emphasizing “perspectives” from indigenous groups, is quite literally composed exclusively of individuals from minority groups who are instruments of the KDP.

Khairi Elias Ali Al Isso (or Khairi Bozani) is the KDP Director General of Yezidi Affairs. This is a man so loyal to the KDP that he does not even acknowledge the well documented fact that KDP peshmerga disarmed and abandoned Yezidis, his own people, to genocide at the hands of ISIS without firing a single bullet.

Salim Shabak MP is a curious character who has represented the KDP-aligned Shabak faction since 2006, and is repeatedly called a traitor by large sections of his own people. They have even made those silly hit-piece videos about him.