(AINA) -- Security forces of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) stormed the offices of the Assyrian Patriotic Party (APP) in Dohuk, northern Iraq on October 21, 1999. Armed members of the KDP entered the premises of the APP headquarters and ordered the closing of the office under threat of force. The APP guards entrusted with safeguarding the premises were forcibly disarmed, dismissed, and threatened not to return.

On October 22, 1999, APP officials traveled to Arbil to meet with KDP officials regarding the reasons for the APP Dohuk headquarters closing. No justification was provided by the KDP for the closure of the office. The APP has been legitimately registered and officially sanctioned to operate in Dohuk as an Assyrian political party. Reportedly, after intensive discussions the KDP relented and allowed the reopening of the party office on October 25, 1999. The specific reasons for the four-day closing remain a mystery.

Various Kurdish Bahdinani elements have recently intensified efforts to thwart Assyrian political expression. The arbitrary and forcible closure and subsequent threats against the APP represent the latest in a series of attacks, blockades, kidnappings, murders and land grabs by some Bahdinani elements against Assyrians in northern Iraq. Those Assyrians residing within the "Assyrian Triangle" have been especially targeted in an effort to further intimidate Assyrians and to permanently alter the demography of the region. Assyrians believe that this demographic alteration of the northern provinces by the Bahdinanis is a crude scheme to sell themselves as the sole heirs to any future confederacy in northern Iraq.

The timing of the closure is believed to also be linked to the Iraqi National Congress (INC) meetings that began on October 29, 1999. In the deliberations leading up to the INC meeting, it became clear to many Assyrians that Assyrian political parties were grossly under represented and that the final Assyrian representative selections were not sufficiently representative of Assyrians residing in Iraq or the Diaspora. With growing resentment by many Assyrians towards the INC in general and certain elements within the opposition in particular, more Assyrians are beginning to voice skepticism regarding the commitment of the INC to democracy and pluralism; the INC's purported goals.

With continued attacks against Assyrians and their political parties, more Assyrian political organizations are weighing the option of boycotting future proceedings of the INC. With the APP office closure the KDP has apparently signaled its intention to intensify threats and persecution of Assyrians within their areas in order to stifle legitimate Assyrian political expression.