Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As the House is aware, my community is home to many thousands of Iraqis who are Christians, Assyrians and Chaldeans. Many people fled Iraq, particularly after the fall of Saddam Hussein, and sought refuge in Australia and, in my experience, every one of them wants to make a contribution to their new country and they do so in many and varied ways, working in many charities and not-for-profit organisations across our country. I want to mention one Assyrian Australian today who is also giving back to her home country, her original country of Iraq, and that is Fay Daoud, who I met recently on her return visit to Australia. Fay is an Assyrian woman from Fairfield. She got her start working at Fairfield City Council, helping our community. Like so many, her mother and father left Iraq in the 1960s. Her father is a very well known dentist in our community. Now Fay has gone back to work in Iraq with the United Nations as part of the Development Program to help with Iraq's infrastructure and services, to rebuild schools and hospitals and to restore roads and infrastructure after the desecration and destruction of ISIS, to fight poverty and to ensure immediate access to income by providing short-term employment and public works schemes. She has gone back to the place her family fled from, and she has shown great bravery in doing so. My last visit to Iraq was in 2018, and it is true to say it is not yet a safe community, particularly for Christians and members of the Assyrian community. But she is doing what she believes is right, and we all support her in doing so.

She was stationed by the UN in Baghdad in 2018. For the last three years she has been working to help communities after the conflicts that they have had to endure, an important part of which involves facilitating those who fled their homes to return, rebuild and get back to as close to normal as possible, right throughout Iraq, in those cities and villages that have been destroyed by ISIS. This is an enormous effort. Again, I've seen this myself in Erbil and have been briefed on the situation in Mosul. It requires a big effort on the part of the international community to help Iraq rebuild. Since 2015 the program has raised $1.5 billion, but much more is needed.

I also take this opportunity to note that this weekend will be the Assyrian and Chaldean new year. I know the member for Calwell is a very active participant in this. I say to members of the Assyrian community: Howya brikhta reesha d'sheeta qa koleh Atoorayeh—Happy New Year to all Assyrians! It is a very important festival right throughout Australia. The beginning of April marks the new year for Assyrians. It is a time to celebrate Assyrian and Chaldean culture and to hope that one day Assyrians and Chaldeans can return to Iraq and live in peace.