“We have to ask the world: ‘Why are you silent?'”

From Vatican Radio: 

“Where is the respect for the rights of Christians?” the Auxiliary Bishop of Baghdad Shlemon Warduni asks Vatican Radio. “We have to ask the world: Why are you silent? Why do not you speak out? Do human rights exist, or not? And if they exist, where are they?  There are many, many cases that should arouse the conscience of the whole world: Where is Europe? Where is America?”

…The German based aid agency Christian Aid Program of Northern Iraq (CAPNI) – one of the few operative in the area – reports that all churches and monasteries in Mosul have been seized by Islamic State jihadists.

On Tuesday, the leaders of the Iraqi Christian communities, Catholic and Orthodox met in Erbil, appealing to people worldwide to break the silence surrounding the ethnic cleansing of Christian, Yezedi and Shabak minorities from Northern Iraq.

“We are faced with this situation. The patriarch and bishops we now find ourselves in the north and we are trying to get to grips with this serious, very serious situation”, the Auxiliary Bishop Warduni tells says.

“We ask ourselves why is this happening? These things against human dignity? Against God, against mankind … “These [people] rip the medicines from the hands of children, small children and throw them on the ground …”.

Read it all. 

And for more, check out this report on “religious cleansing.”