A visiting Assyrian delegation from the United States to the Kurdistan Region told Rudaw that they obtained a landmark approval from Duhok authorities to build a monument in Simele to honor victims of the 1933 Simele massacre.

A delegation of Assyrians from the US visited the Kurdistan Region on Sunday and met with top Kurdish leaders, including President Nechirvan Barzani, Prime Minister Masrour Barzani, and Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) leader Masoud Barzani, to discuss the current situation of Assyrians in the Region.

Sam Darmo, head of the Foundation of Assyrians for Justice, described the meetings as "very good" and "very fruitful."

"For the first time in 92 years, finally, we were able to get the approval of the KRG [Kurdistan Regional Government] from the Governor of Duhok, Mr. Ali Tatar, where now a land will be dedicated to the remembrance of the 1933 Simele massacre that happened in Simele by the Iraqi government," Darmo told Rudaw.

"This will be the first time ever that land was allocated by the KRG so we can build a monument there and also an exhibit," he added.

Assyrians annually commemorate the Simele massacre of 1933, when thousands were killed by the Iraqi army. Between August 7 and August 11, the armed forces of the Kingdom of Iraq attacked 63 Assyrian villages located in what are now the provinces of Nineveh and Duhok. The campaign left around 3,000 Assyrians dead, according to a 2003 report from the International Federation for Human Rights.

According to Darmo, the main purpose of their visit was to ensure that Assyrians stay in their ancestral homeland and refrain from leaving the country.

"This is our ancestral land," he stressed, calling for the provision of jobs, Assyrian schools, hospitals, and fair representation in elections for the community.

Since 2003, the Kurdistan Region has served as a sanctuary for many of Iraq's ethnic and religious minorities due to its relative stability and security amid broader violence and sectarian conflicts in Iraq.

Prior to that, the Region's political system had made institutional efforts to include minorities, most notably through a quota system in the Kurdish legislature. This system reserves a specific number of seats for minority groups, including Assyrian, Chaldean, and Syriac Christians, along with Turkmen and Armenians to ensure their political voice is heard.

More recently, in 2014, the Islamic State (ISIS) launched a blitz offensive, seizing large swathes of territory in Iraq's north and west. The group's persecution of minority groups, including Christians, Turkmen, Shabak and Yazidis, prompted hundreds of thousands of them to flee, with many settling in the Kurdistan Region's Erbil and Duhok provinces.

The following is the full transcript of the interview with Sam Darmo:

Rudaw: Welcome to Rudaw, I'm very happy to have you here.

Sam Darmo: Thank you.

First, can you tell me about your intention and your goal? What's the reason that you visited Kurdistan? What's the goal behind it?

Well, first of all, I've never been here before, never in my life. So I thought it's time to visit my ancestral land. Second, we had a mission for our people here to build a better relationship between Assyrians in America and the KRG. So that's why we are here.

How did you see it since it's your first time? How was it? Was it close to your imagination?

I never thought it was this beautiful, actually, and the progress that has been made, it's amazing. I was telling my colleagues that it looks like we are in America, we never left America, honestly. So I commend the progress that is made here by the KRG.

You have the chance to do some meetings with, for example, Mr. President [Masoud] Barzani, President Nechirvan Barzani, Prime Minister Masrour Barzani, and a lot of other people here in Kurdistan. So can you tell me about the outcomes of these meetings?

It was very good meetings and very fruitful. First of all, this is for the first time in 92 years, finally, we were able to get the approval of the KRG from the Governor of Duhok, Mr. Ali Tatar, where now a land will be dedicated to the remembrance of the 1933 Simele massacre that happened in Simele by the Iraqi government, the Iraqi army against unarmed Assyrian civilians. So in 92 years, this will be the first time ever that land was allocated by KRG so we can build a monument there and also an exhibit.

In Simele?

In Simele itself. And that's where the massacre started from. But 62 other Assyrian villages were affected by it, but it started from Simele. So that's it. That was a great accomplishment, and we're very proud of it.

Were there any special requirements about Assyrians here in Kurdistan that you've asked those people and delegations that you've met?

2003, when the war started, right after the war, our population in Iraq has decreased by a huge amount. For example, in Basra, we used to have a church, we used to have a club, now not even a single Assyrian lives in Basra. In Baghdad, 95 percent of our population left Baghdad and they seek refuge outside of Iraq.

All of them?

Oh yes. And many of them came here. And the reason they moved here was because for safety, for security. Here, no one is bombing their churches, no one is invading their homes and killing their children, and also no one is forcing them to convert to any other religion. So that's why they are here. But we had some issues. Our main goal for coming here really is on how to help the Assyrians to stay here, not leave the country. This is our ancestral land. So that's why we're here. So in order for us to make that possible, we need the help of KRG.

What kind of help? What do you need?

If you want to prevent people from leaving the country, what do they need? They need a job. Security is there.

Services, security.

No problem with the security, but they need a job. They need good schools, good Assyrian schools. We need some improvement there. They need jobs, they need, you know, schooling, hospitals, and that's the main things. Also, there are some issues that we have discussed about the quota and elections and how that needs to be changed. They are calling it the Christian quota. But, I mean, if it is Christian, then Christians should vote for who they want them, to represent them. The way it is right now, the Christian representation in Baghdad, they don't really represent Christians because they were not voted by Christians. They were voted by non-Christians. So they can't call that a Christian quota. So we discussed that too, that issue. And that issue should be solved by the Iraqi federal government. The KRG has no control over it. So we have to go back to the United States and see if we can tell our government to pressure the Iraqi government to make this possible.

Do you intend to visit Baghdad also?

No, I'm not.

Okay. About Assyrians here, I think what I've been taking from your words is you're happy about their situation here, but you need more, of course. So do you have any messages for the Assyrians who stayed here in Kurdistan or in Iraq in general, if there are any. So what do you have to tell them?

There were some other issues that we discussed with the leadership of KRG. We appreciate especially Kak Masoud [Barzani]. He kept insisting that Assyrians should stay here. They should have no reason to leave. We will provide everything they want, but they have to stay here. This is their country. They are not in a foreign country. This is their country. That's why they should stay here. President Nechirvan Barzani also mentioned that this is their origin. These are the indigenous people. This is their country. They should not leave. So we discussed some issues with land encroachment, and I was so happy today when I presented these cases to Prime Minister Masrour Barzani. He promised that he will take care of it. There are some...

Legal issues?

There are some court orders, first of all. Our people went to courts when their land was confiscated.

And they won the case.

They won the case. But it was never implemented. Never enforced. So Prime Minister Masrour Barzani, he has the files now, and he said that he will personally take care of it. And we appreciate that. And the Assyrians, the landowners, will appreciate that so much. Also, there's other land encroachment cases that never went to court, those will be handled after this is done. And step by step, everything will be handled. I'm sure of that.

Kurds and Assyrians, they have historical bonds.

Exactly.

Can you tell me more about them? How do you see these bonds? How do you see, how do you evaluate these relationships now?

I was telling Prime Minister Masrour Barzani and I also told Kak Masoud that our goal now is to rebuild that relation that we had at the time of the late Abdulsalam Barzani and our Assyrian martyr, Patriarch Mar Benyamin Shimun. They had a very strong relationship, and they were working together to establish a confederation, an Assyrian-Kurdish-Armenian confederation, and that didn't happen because of many different reasons. We believe, Kurds and Assyrians, we have the same destiny in this region. So we have to work together. We have to accept each other. We have to protect each other and live in peace with each other. So we have to do whatever we can to make our relationship stronger. And I have complete trust in the leadership of KRG that this is their goals too.