by Stoyan Zaimov
The Christian Post
"We are begging the West to stand for the rights of all citizens in Iraq and Syria," the spiritual leader of the world's 158,000 Syriac Catholics declared in a speech during a visit to Detroit, according to Catholic San Francisco.
"The situation is very devastating and tragic. For Iraq, this has been happening for two generations. For Syria, the war has been taking place for the last three years, with no hope on the horizon for Christians in the area."
Patriarch Younan focused on the various atrocities facing Christians across the region, from executions and forced conversions at the hands of the Islamic State terror group, to the destruction of churches, and trafficking of women and girls as sex slaves.
Militants in northeast Syria are now estimated to have abducted at least 220 Assyrian Christians this week, a group monitoring the war reported.
"The crisis is evolving into more killings, more hostages and a struggle with no end in sight," he added. "We've been through these struggles for 14 months, since the fall of Mosul on June 10, 2014. Since then, all the Christian communities in northern Iraq have been wiped out..."