Assyrians in Canada

Assyrians in Canada are Canadian citizens of Assyrian descent or persons of Assyrian descent residing in Canada. According to the 2011 Census there were 10,810 Canadians who claimed Assyrian ancestry.

History

Most Assyrians arrived in Canada due to ethnic and religious conflicts, leaving Turkey, Iran, and Iraq. The migration to Canada may be broken up into a number of distinct periods: early settlement and the subsequent waves of migration sparked by the Assyrian genocide in present-day Turkey, the Iranian Revolution of 1979 and, more recently, the Iraq War. The last 2006 Census Canada counted 8,650 Assyrians in the country. The first period of known mass-migration came just after the Assyrian Genocide in the dying days of the Turkish Ottoman Empire. The second and perhaps largest wave of migration into came during the Iran-Iraq War. Under the shadow of war, Saddam Hussein's al-Anfal Campaign constituted a major force for migration for Iraq's Assyrian population.

See also

• Assyrians in the United States
• Ethnic origins of people in Canada