Pleas to the World Bodies
 

May the pleas of millions of dispossessed and suffering peoples reach the ears of the world leaders and nudge their conscience. May the pleas of the dispossessed natives touch their hearts that they may care, rescue the indigenous peoples, and ease their chronic plight.

Urgency to remove tension and bring understanding lies mainly with the UN, the international community and responsible leaders. They need to make serious efforts to redress grievances of the indigenous and oppressed peoples before fulfilment of the prophecy of Isaiah 2:4.

If the main objective of the UN is to maintain international peace and security, then it should act responsibly in its endeavour to achieve that goal. It is a mammoth and unprecedented task. Many observers wonder if the UN is worthy of the task. Should it fail, the sign posted at the U.N. entrance stating Isaiah 2:4 will be an historical landmark, testifying that the UN tried and failed to realise its fundamental objective. However, its fulfilment will bring equity, peace and joy to those who remain steadfast in their conviction of loving their neighbours as themselves, for

“He shall judge between the nations,
And shall rebuke many people;
They shall beat their swords into ploughshares,
And their spears into pruning hooks;
Nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
Neither they shall know war anymore.”

(Isaiah: 2:4)
 

Human rights situation will worsen and will have a far-reaching and devastating effect on ethnic groups in all undemocratic countries of Asia and the Far East. For fear of losing trade, with more aggressive competitors, industrialized countries allow the exploitation of convicts and children. They encourage developing countries to exploit them as child labour, child soldier, child farmer and child domestic slave. Enslavement and treatment of human resources as a commodity to manufacture cheaper goods and enhance trade in competition with modern technology and automation leads to degradation of human dignity. It becomes more costly to maintain world peace.

In some instances the UN instead of assuming the role of world leadership and acting accordingly drops in status from arbiter to middleman as it happened in Rwanda and Burundi where over eight hundred thousand (800,000) innocent lives were lost; a bad reflection on her image, leading to loss of trust in her dubious actions and prestige. It is getting harder to love your neighbour as yourself because of the widening gap between rich and poor. Automation was a God-sent help to narrow the rich-poor gap, and not widen it. Siding with a group of conviction in faith and affiliation against another group, while the second group being of the same faith yet of different affiliation is breach of trust and perfidy.

During World War I, the Ottoman Empire massacred millions of innocent Armenians, Assyrians, Greeks and other Christians. It expelled hundreds of thousands more from their homes and seized their land, in particular the Assyrian Hakkari highlands of the Van District.

During World II, the Axis Powers, specifically Germany, targeted the Jews. Over six million civilian Jews were brutally killed, massacred and gassed to death. Leaders of such nations died terrible deaths and their dreams of building an empire crumbled with them. Other leaders were punished for their crimes, their arrogance and cruelty against humanity. The notion of building empires on human misery is yet to be extinguished amongst regimes and by the more progressive democratic governments.

The usurped homeland of the Assyrian people must be freed from oriental colonialism, either politically or by legitimate force, through the United Nations and open support of the international community, in fulfillment of their commitment to human rights as prescribed in the UN Charter. So should territories of other aggrieved peoples if no acceptable compromise is reached between the two parties concerned. If, as the Arab saying goes, ‘God's earth is vast’, then why hold on to other people’s land? In the past fifty years or so, the world has changed very dramatically and so has the United Nations in its concept, forbearance and concern over abuse of human rights, and the welfare of humanity and its well-being, viewing inhabitants of this planet earth as an extension of world family.

Settlement of the Assyrian question has long been overdue, ever since the fall and disintegration of the Ottoman Empire in the early 20th century, and colonization of the Middle East by the Dar Al-Silm states of Islam. The duty of world democratic institutions is to cooperate with the United Nations. They are urged to take up the subject of Oriental decolonisation seriously, to extend its arm and apply it with the full force of the law to free the world from all forms of colonialism and oppression that equity and peace may prevail.

Based on this view, it is appropriate for the United Nations to re-open and bring up the unsettled question of the Assyrian homeless people. The UN, in compliance with its charter, has the legal right to take up the challenge and seriously review and re-examine the unfinished business of the Assyrian displaced people. The UN needs to stand up to its beliefs, exercise its duties responsibly and perform in conformity with the prescribed stipulations of its charter. It should take appropriate measures to resolve the Assyrian outstanding problem and reach a just solution, in restoring their homeland and rehabilitate them in their traditional region which falls within the four domineering Islamic states of the Abode of Peace in the northern region of Mesopotamia. The world looks up to the UN as its deliverer. It needs to stand up to its beliefs and apply itself accordingly, in defending and protecting the aggrieved, and reducing the exploitation of the weak and the impoverished by the strong, bringing peace, justice and equity.

The Assyrians, being dispossessed and having been denied their national identity are scattered all around the world. They are not allowed to return to their homes. They are on the run looking for a place to toil and live in peace. It needs the political will of a determined and resilient body of high morality to re-activate the subject file of the Assyrian people and resolve the outstanding question in the spirit of true justice.

With the good efforts and wisdom of the majority of its members, the United Nations is able to adopt a new line of approach of boldness and fortitude. It would free itself from the entanglements of past errors of the defunct League of Nations, and act with a clear conscience in its capacity as an arbiter and peacemaker, and not a mediator.

The Assyrians will continue to strive for attainment of their rights. Being Christian, they place their hope in their Creator and the goodwill of the international community and the world body of the United Nations. May Job 14:7-9 be fulfilled for the restoration of Assyria and the peace described in Isaiah 19:23-25. Fulfilment of this prophecy will set an example for the rest of the nations to live in neighbourly peace with one another.
 

“For there is hope for a tree, If it is cut down, that it will sprout again, And that its tender shoots will not cease. Though its root may grow old in the earth, and its stump may die in the ground, yet at the scent of water it will bud and bring forth branches like a plant.”

(Job 14: 7-9)
 

“In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria, and the Assyrian will come into Egypt and the Egyptian into Assyria, and the Egyptians will serve with the Assyrians. In that day Israel will be one of three with Egypt and Assyria, even a blessing in the midst of the land, whom the Lord of hosts shall bless, saying, Blessed is Egypt My people, and Assyria the work of My hands, and Israel My inheritance.”

(Isaiah 19:23-25)

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