Citizens State Bank owner Chris Yatoma, member of the Chaldean House of Representatives, traveled to Iraq in late November to meet with the US congressional delegation, along with US representatives Elisa Slokin, Katie Porter, Colleen Allred and Mark Takano, chairman of the House Committee on Veterans Affairs.
With a $50,000 leadership gift from Yatoma, the new microfund has raised $100,000 from Chaldean American business leaders in southeast Michigan, Mana said.
The council created a label called “Product of Nineveh” to help promote products and goods made in the remaining Chaldean villages in northern Iraq, and plans to promote and sell the products to the diaspora community, including those living in Michigan, he said.
He is in talks with Iraqi governments to see if they can create a sister city or sister state.
“After the opening of the office, it will help us to accelerate our efforts,” Mana said.
Mana said he will join the US congressional delegation to support US policy to protect the Chaldeans, Yezidis and other ethnic minorities in Iraq and help create administrative regions with local government and police services.
Annual congressional delegation trips are planned starting next year, Mana said.
“It’s interesting to see firsthand what American policy has created,” he said.
Unfortunately, in It was the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 that wiped out the Chaldean population…because of the country’s insecurity and religious extremism targeting religious minorities like the Chaldeans who are considered allies of the West.
Delegations can show how U.S. policy can help sustain and strengthen these minorities, Mana said.
