BAGHDAD — On March 5, three bodies representing Iraqi minorities issued a joint statement calling for a semi-autonomous region in the country’s north. The idea was proposed by the Yazidi Independent Supreme Council, the Turkmen Rescue Foundation and Al-Rafidain Organization, representing Iraq’s Assyrian Christians. The canton would comprise three contiguous regions: Sinjar, Tal Afar and the Ninevah plain.

The proposal is the most complete vision the minorities have yet put forward as an alliance, with the aim of extracting themselves from the Arab-Kurdish struggle for their areas and to prevent a repetition of the catastrophic killing and displacement they suffered when the Islamic State (IS) invaded Ninevah province and raided the areas where they live.

The minorities have previously put forward plans focused specifically on setting up a province for the minorities on the Ninevah plain. That province would stretch across areas disputed between Arabs and Kurds but that are considered the homeland of several Iraqi minorities: the Ninevah plain (home to several minorities, particularly Christians and Shabak), Tal Afar (majority Turkmens) and Sinjar (the main home of the Yazidis).

The organizations proposing the idea avoided any hint of separatism. The project was proposed in line with Iraq’s 2005 Constitution, which gives minorities the right to autonomy or self-administration in sub-units of territory (Chapter 1; Sections 5, 112, 115 and 116).