Catholic News Agency reports that the Australian Embassy in Amman, Jordan has issued 27 visas which will allow some young Iraqis to participate in World Youth Day.  Initially 170 Chaldeans applied for Visas to participate in the largest gathering of world youth Christians in history.  True to their faith, the Chaldeans still expressed their gratitude and appreciation to the Australian government for allowing 27 delegates.

“I would like to thank the Australian government for everything they have been able to do and also the Australian embassy to the Holy See which has contributed to this positive ending,” Father Philip Najim, Chaldean Prosecutor to the Holy See, said.  “Many in Iraq were waiting for this.  It is a symbolic number of visas but our youngsters will be in Sydney too and that’s what counts.”

Mosul, IRAQ – Christian churches in Iraq continue to receive threatening notices foreshadowing potentially violent attacks against the non-Muslim religious centers.  In the northern Iraqi city of Mosul parishioners fear the worst after a letters were received asking them not to cooperate with US forces. 

“We don’t cooperate with anyone.  They use this as an excuse to attack, torture, hold for ransom, and kill innocent people,” says Khalid Bunni, a parishioner in the region.  

Baghdad, IRAQ - Senior research fellow, Brian J. Grim, paints a harrowing picture of the ongoing persecution of Iraqi Christians.  The research expert on religion and world affairs with the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life in Washington, D.C. reports that the situation for Christians in Iraq is worsening. 

“It is no small irony, of course, that the Shiite majority that's now a leading force in Iraq was brutalized and suppressed under Saddam, who extensively curbed the Shiites' religious freedoms. A State Department report in 2002 said Saddam's government ‘severely restricts or bans outright many Shiite religious practices.’ One might think that those fresh memories would be enough to ensure liberties for Iraq's religious minorities today. Yet that appears not to be the case,” writes Grim in his report. 

Iraqi Christians are part of historic indigenous communities that have been in what is now Iraq nearly since the time of Christ, several centuries before Islam came to the region. The majority of them are Chaldean Christians, an ancient religious group affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church.

London, UK - The Lord's Prayer will be read in Aramaic at a special Mass celebrated by Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor at Westminster Cathedral next week in support of Iraqi Christians.

At a time when many of Iraq’s Christians have been forced to flee the volatile situation in their homeland, the Mass at 5:30pm on June 16 will offer an opportunity for bishops and worshippers to come together and stand in solidarity with the country’s Christian community.

In addition to the Lord’s Prayer being read in Aramaic – the language closest to Christ’s dialect – the Gospel will be sung in Arabic. The Mass will also allow people to pray for peace in Iraq and also for Iraqi communities here in England and Wales.

California, USA – “No Riza Maraka!  Who do I blame,” says Anthony Matti of Chula Vista, California.  Amid growing concerns of global rice shortage two of America’s biggest retailers place a limit on rice purchases.  Wal-Mart's warehouse chain Sam's Club, the largest warehouse and food grocery retailer in the US is limiting bulk purchases of rice this week, citing "recent supply and demand trends".  Seattle-based Costco Wholesale Corporation has also imposed limits in some stores on bulk rice purchases.

“I bet the limits are in Michigan, Chicago, Arizona, and here,” says Matti with a sly smile.  “It is no coincidence Chaldeans live mostly in those regions.  Chaldeans are eating too much rizza maraka (rice and stew) and we are causing a rice shortage.  What do you expect?  Chaldeans are not going to eat that fast food poison or restaurant filth.”

Chuckling over his own sense of humor, Matti does have a serious side.  The undergraduate student just submitted his final exam paper titled the Economic Food Web.

Matti says that world rice prices have more than doubled in the past year as demand has outstripped supply.  “The culprits include the drought-ravaged rice crop shortage, alternative fuel technologies, global population growth, speculation on food prices, and rise in traditional fuel prices.” 

Ninevah, IRAQ - It would seem Iraqi Christians are able to embrace the democratic principles of petitioning government, free speech, and the right to assemble.  For most of the week, peaceful marches have been held by Iraqi Christians in hopes of drawing attention to the injustice and persecution Christians face.  The silent marches send reverberating waves throughout the country as other Iraqis look on in interest. 

Each day hundreds of Chaldeans and other Christians march down streets holding photos of Christian Martyrs.   Loud in action and small in talk the Iraqi Christians call for justice.  The council of Nineveh bishops, which include the community and religious leaders of all Christian communities in the Ninevah region of Iraq support the marches.

Men, women, and children march holding pictures of Archbishop Rahho to Fr Ragheed and Fr Paul Iskandar, all victims killed by radical Islamist hoping to drive Christians out of their land.  Marchers also carried hundreds of pictures of Christian family members who have been killed for their faith, resisting kidnapping attempts, refusal to convert, or because they owned shops that sold alcoholic beverages (banned by Islam).  The protestors walked through the streets of Bartella, Karamles, Qaraqosh, al Qosh.

Berlin, GERMANY - Germany is mulling calls for it to take in up to 30,000 Christians who have fled intimidation and violence in Iraq, an Interior Ministry spokeswoman said Saturday, confirming an account in the news magazine Der Spiegel.

Iraq's Christians, who have lived in Mesopotamia since before the advent of Islam, have fled en masse to refugee camps in Jordan and Syria and say the reduction in fighting between Shiites and Sunnis has not benefited them, with killings of Christians continuing.

Interior Ministry experts in Berlin were studying suggestions from the Catholic and Lutheran churches that Germany declare a quota for resettlement by Iraqi Christian refugees, Der Spiegel said.

Saskatchewan, CANADA - Pope Benedict celebrated a special memorial Mass in the Vatican chapel in honor of Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho. Pope Benedict has called Rahho's death an "inhuman act of violence" that offended human dignity.  In his homily Monday, the Pope called Archbishop Rahho a man of peace and dialogue who paid particular attention to the poor and handicapped in his flock.

"Let his example support all Iraqis of good will — Christians and Muslims — to work for a peaceful coexistence, founded on human brotherhood and reciprocal respect," Pope Benedict said.  Most every other country followed the Pope’s lead in condemning the torture and murder and calling on the Iraqi government to be more vigilant in protecting the rights of its citizens. 

For Chaldean tween, Joseph Markos' leap-year birthday was celebrated this year amid grief in his Iraqi-born family.  "I was kind of sad because it was the same day the archbishop was kidnapped," said the 12-year-old at a news conference in Saskatoon, concerning the death of the Iraqi archbishop.  For teenager Mohammed Abeed Kahoury and his parents the memorial of the Archbishop helped them make their decision to enroll in catechism classes to learn more about Christianity.  

Baghdad, IRAQ - Tariq Aziz, the public face of Saddam Hussein's regime who has been held for nearly five years without charge, is now so ill that he will probably die before he is tried.

Saddam's urbane, cigar-smoking Deputy Prime Minister has lung disease and it is unlikely that his case will ever reach court, sources have said.

Mr Aziz's son, Ziad, said that he was unaware of his father's condition because his lawyer had been unable to visit him recently because of security concerns. But he understood that his father had been moved into a shared cell at Camp Cropper, part of the huge US base surrounding Baghdad airport, so a fellow detainee could monitor him.

London, UK- Britain’s Royal Society of Medicine (RSM) had organised a ceremony in honour of Chaldean businessman Nadhmi Auchi, Chairman of General Mediterranean Holding (GMH), and President of the Anglo Arab Organisation (AAO).  The ceremony, which took place at the RSM building in London, was in appreciation of Auchi’s efforts in supporting the cause of medicine in the United Kingdom, which included funding medical research projects and sponsorships.

Present at the ceremony were a number of Arab Ambassadors, British Lords and MPs, and prominent figures in the medical profession. As a token of gratitude, the RSM has named the main hall in his name “The Nadhmi Auchi Foyer".