Although Islamic State has been defeated in northern Iraq, the “Islamist mindset” that persists in the region has made Christian refugees from the region “afraid to return,” according to one of Iraq’s most senior Catholic Bishops.

Chaldean Catholic Archbishop Najeeb Michaeel Moussa of Mosul and Akra told Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need that although Christians in Iraq remain active and hopeful about the future, the ancient Christian presence in the region, already much diminished by years of war and persecution, is threatened by a resurgence of Islamic extremism.

Archbishop Moussa explain-ed that among Christians, the greatest fear, and one which prevents Christians from returning to their former homes in Mosul, “is that of seeing the renewed growth of Islamic fundamentalism.”

Before the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, around 1.4 mill-ion Christians lived in the country. At present, fewer than 250,000 remain: a drop of 80% in less than two decades. Under the Islamic state, Christians were often offered a choice between conversion to Islam and death; at best, they were expected to pay a special levy to ISIS in return for their lives. In Mosul, Arch-bishop Moussa’s diocese, of the roughly 15,000 Christian residents of the region prior to ISIS’s rule over the region, none remained by the time of the area’s liberation in 2017. Although Mosul is one of the largest cities in Iraq, few Christians have so far returned there.