Patriarch Sako: the “solution” to the “Iraqi crisis” is a “secular state” founded on citizenship

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Iraq must preserve its “unity” in the “diversity of its components” and their “multiplicity”, although in recent years “most political parties” have fueled and sharpened “sectarianism and fragmentation” writes the Chaldean primate Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako.
In a message published on the patriarchate website the Cardinal states that the “solution” to the “Iraqi crisis” is a “secular state” founded on citizenship. The “goal”, continues the cardinal, “is the integration” of the various components and “service to citizens” without distinction of identity.
Card Sako, who met Pope Francis in the Vatican at the meeting of the patriarchs of the Catholic Churches of the East, is writing in a context of profound political and social turmoil, with street protests taking place for months against corruption and economic crisis. The authorities have repeatedly tried to quell the demonstrations, triggering clashes that have resulted in over 500 deaths.
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In the message published by the Chaldean patriarch, he recalls the “mosaic” of “civilizations, cultures, nationalities, languages and religions” at the basis of Iraq, which constitutes “a single national and human heritage” as emerges “from peaceful demonstrators in the squares” . The cardinal continues, “a secular state” is needed which is founded on “civil society and not on the church or the mosque” because faith “does not build a state”.
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Photo: Catholic News Agency