head with a rifle butt, and left me. It was near Fallujah. My face was covered in blood.58 Many of the Iraqi migrants and asylum seekers in Greece are also Christians who have fled targeted persecution. A 33-year-old Christian from Baghdad—who has not sought asylum in Greece—gave this account of his reasons for fleeing: A Sunni militia killed my father and my sister’s husband in 2005. My younger sister’s husband was kidnapped, held for a $25,000 ransom and released. I had a car and was going between Baghdad and Syria when AlQaeda in Iraq stopped me in al-Anbar. They told me to become a Muslim or they would kill me. I declared the Shahada.59 They followed me to my neighborhood, Dora. They destroyed my house. I took my wife and children, and we moved to northern Iraq, but you can only stay in the north if you are from the north. I am not a Kurd. I couldn’t go out. I couldn’t work there. I could not support my family.60 58 Human Rights Watch interview (name withheld, B-15), Athens, May 27, 2008. 59 The Islamic declaration of faith. 60 Human Rights Watch interview (name withheld, B-12), Athens, May 26, 2008. 31 Human Rights Watch November 2008