VARIOUS-IRAQ-CRISIS/REFUGEES-FABIUS Iraqi Christians fly to new life in France after escaping Islamic State

Record ID: 274642

  • Title: VARIOUS-IRAQ-CRISIS/REFUGEES-FABIUS Iraqi Christians fly to new life in France after escaping Islamic State
  • Date: 20th September 2014
  • Summary: ARBIL, IRAQ (SEPTEMBER 20, 2014) (REUTERS) OLD WOMAN IN WHEELCHAIR AND OTHER IRAQI REFUGEES AT AIRPORT TERMINAL REFUGEES SLEEPING ON CHAIRS CLOSE-UP OF BOY NURSE COMFORTING CHILD LYING DOWN ON CHAIRS CHILD LYING DOWN AND CRYING (SOUNDBITE) (English) IRAQI REFUGEE, SAMER, SAYING: "Yes, I leave Iraq because I'm afraid, I'm afraid for my life, for my kids, my little daughter.
  • Embargoed: 5th October 2014 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: France
  • Country: France
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA73QVI7YPZN4EZEYYERLQTRPG3
  • Story Text: On a warm evening at Arbil International Airport in Iraqi Kurdistan, some 150 mostly Christian refugees anxiously waited to flee their homeland aboard a French government plane.
    The refugees, of all ages and from 25 different families, had one message as they prepared to fly to Paris to escape the threat of Islamic State militants: Christians and Muslims can no longer live together in Iraq.
    "Yes, I leave Iraq because I'm afraid, I'm afraid for my life, for my kids, my little daughter. She's sleeping over there. She's sleeping. I'm scared, too much nights, I'm sleeping in scare, I don't know what should I do," said Iraqi refugee Samer on Saturday (September 20).
    "We cannot trust anyone. We cannot trust anyone because they have betrayed us as a Christian people, many times. So why to stay here? We want to find our future, we want to build a new life, for me, for my husband, for my kids in the future. We want a new start, ok? So we decided to leave our house. This is the only solution for us, so we are leaving abroad," said Iraqi Christian Sara, who was leaving her homeland with her husband.
    France has led European efforts to bring humanitarian aid to refugees. The government plane, an Airbus A310, delivered 10 more tonnes of blankets, tents, jerry cans and hygiene kits before transporting the refugees back to Paris.
    French fighter jets on Friday (September 19) launched strikes inside Iraq for the first time as part of an international coalition that will initially focus on pushing Islamic State back from Iraq to its power base in Syria. It has also delivered weapons, mostly machine guns and ammunition, to Kurdish Peshmerga fighters.
    France, under pressure from public opinion to admit more Christians from the Middle East, has already taken in around 100 people since Islamic State launched its military offensive in Iraq in June.
    About 40 Christians arrived from northern Iraq at the end of August, based on strict criteria that they had family ties in France and sufficient resources to survive there. Another 60 have also come by their own means.
    For most of the refugees, coming to France brings fear of the unknown. Few speak French and most have never before even taken a plane, let alone travelled to a Western country.
    But they are hopeful of a better future in France.
    "The most important thing is that there is security, better than what we have left - there was no security. The French state has organised everything for us. Thank you," said 28-year-old Jade.
    Iraq's ancient Christian population has more than halved over the past decade or so, from about 1 million before the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003 to barely 400,000 by July this year.
    The United Nations says there are now about 1.2 million displaced Iraqis, including 850,000 in the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq where many live in dire conditions.
    An estimated 200,000 Christians have fled their homes in the Nineveh region of northern Iraq since Islamic State swept through their villages this summer, demanding they convert to Islam, pay taxes for being Christians or face death.
    More than 10,000 Iraqi Christians have already applied for asylum, according to AEMO, a French association that helps minorities in the Middle East, since Paris said in July it would be ready to take hundreds if not thousands.
    Among the passengers flying to Paris on Saturday were also a number of Yazidis. Followers of an ancient religion derived from Zoroastrianism, they fled their homeland in the Sinjar mountains as Islamic State militants, who see them as devil worshippers, seized towns and carried out mass killings in August.
    Welcoming the refugees personally at Charles de Gaulle airport on Saturday, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said that taking too many refugees would hand a symbolic victory to Islamic State, which has the ultimate objective of ridding the country of all those who oppose its austere version of Islam.
    However, he added, that receiving the refugees was also an act of self-defence for France.
    "The issue is that one has to defend oneself because the group that is operating, the group called Daash, the beheaders," said Fabius, using the Arabic term for the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), Islamic State's previous name.
    "Of course they have committed appalling massacres in Iraq and Syria, but it doesn't only concern the region, it concerns us as well. So we are defending ourselves. It's not only an act of generosity, it's an act of defence. Because, in addition, as you know there are quite a few French people who are leaving to wage jihad, we need to be extremely active and vigilant to prevent them from coming back and doing things in France," the FM continued to say.
    Many of the refugees, traumatised by their experiences of the last three months, clearly could not envisage ever returning to a country so deeply split along ethnic and sectarian lines.
    More than 10,000 Iraqi Christians have already applied for asylum, according to AEMO, a French association that helps minorities in the Middle East, since Paris said in July it would be ready to take hundreds if not thousands.
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