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The Babylon Brigades, which identifies as a Christian militia in Iraq but has Shiite Muslim members and is closely tied to Iran, is taking over Ninevah Plains towns in the country's Christian heartland, displacing Christian mayors and officials on behalf of Iran after Islamic State was swept out.
A militia leader closely linked to Iran, Rayan al-Kildani, has removed Christian officials in the historic Christian towns of Iraq's Ninevah Plains, said Nadine Maenza, president of the Washington-based International Religious Freedom Secretariat, who recently visited the area.
Maenza told VOA al-Kildani has been working to install local leaders who agree with Iran's vision for Iraq. The militia leader portrays himself to be a Christian.
"He took over the Ninevah Council," Maenza said. "He got his own people elected and then he started buying them off. He removed 15 mayors and directors. He replaced all with his own people. So, he basically took over the Ninevah Plains. There are no more Christian (political) leaders outside of the KRG (Kurdistan Regional Government) control."
Maenza met with some of the mayors who lost their jobs.
Her organization encourages the improvement of religious freedom conditions in 40 countries worldwide, including Iraq. Maenza said local Christians hope an Iraqi Federal Court will rule on al-Kildani's action.
Writing in the Wilson Center's MENA 360 Degree online publication, Maenza said that if al-Kildani continues his campaign, "it will remove the last independent Christian mayors outside of the Kurdistan region and have a devastating impact on the historic Syriac, Assyrian, and Chaldean Christian cities of Bartella, Qaraqosh, Tel Kef and the Yazidi homeland of Sinjar."
Maenza told VOA al-Kildani's moves follow his success last year in having the title of patriarch removed from Patriarch Cardinal Louis Sako, the head of Iraq's largest Christian denomination, the Chaldean Catholics. It is an ancient Eastern rite church in full communion with the Vatican.
Sako accused al-Kildani of trying to take over Christian endowments and properties.
Al-Kildani denies the charge and accuses Sako of the same. But Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani reinstated Sako's title in June.
Some Iraqi clerics, including Chaldean Catholic Archbishop Bashar Warda of Irbil, view al-Kildani favorably. The Catholic online publication, The Pillar, reports that his "diocese has received al-Kildani's assistance in building and pastoral projects, as well as security assistance and political protection."
The U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned al-Kildani in 2019 for alleged human rights abuses, including intimidation, extortion, persecution of religious minorities, and illegally seizing property.
Michael Knights of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy said al-Kildani's deal-making has raised his profile with the main political blocks running Iraq and supported by Iran.
"Rayan al-Kildani has provided his support for a range of pro-Iran political forces in Iraq to get their own governance appointed and in return he got rewarded with these lower-level appointments in places that he really cared about within the Ninevah Plains," Knights said. "A lot of the folks are angry about Rayan al-Kildani's rise. He has very, very thin credentials to claim leadership of the Christian community in Iraq or control of their property."
Maenza called for the reinstatement of election rules in Iraq to protect the political representation of Christians, Yazidis, and other religious and ethnic minorities in parliament so only minority community members can vote for their own representation.
Since 2009, Iraq has allowed all Iraqis to vote for designated minority parliamentary seats, effectively upending minority control of their own representation. This, observers say, has also encouraged the practice of vote buying from non-Christian Iraqis in the minority quota system.
Al-Kildani's party won four of the five Iraqi parliamentary seats reserved for Christians in the last election. His candidates were backed by Shiite political forces.
Still, Knights urged the U.S., the European Union and the worldwide Christian community to work on tightening sanctions on al-Kildani, whether on his property abroad or by curtailing his ability to travel, as another step to rein in his - and Iran's - growing dominance.