As CEO of the Near East Center for Strategic Engagement (NEC-SE) and a US Army combat veteran who was proud to serve alongside British military personnel in Iraq and in recognition of British citizens who served under the Assyrian flag and within Assyrian Army ranks from 2014-2017, I wish to express my heartfelt condolences to the British royal family and the citizens of the United Kingdom on the passing of Queen Elizabeth II.

The ties between Great Britain and the global Assyrian community are longstanding, reaching back to the early 1800s when missionaries from England established relations with Assyrian Christians in Hakkari and Urmia, modern-day Turkey, and Iran. British scholars have also conducted archaeological excavations and research in the Assyria Nineveh Plain (ANP) region in today’s Iraq. Most notable in this regard was the discovery of Nineveh and other important Assyrian sites by Sir Austen Henry Layard, Assyrian archeologist Hormuz Rassam, and others. Many cuneiform tablets, reliefs, and others uncovered by these men now reside at the famous British Museum in London.

The late Assyrian Patriarch Mar Eshai Shimun attended the university of Canterbury and the University of Cambridge, with Assyrian Patriarch Mar Dinkha IV’s consecration in the West London Church at St. Barnabas, Ealing. Presently the UK is home to a thriving Assyrian community.

May God be with the British royal family and the British people in this time of sorrow over the passing of Elizabeth II.