Assyrian population in 1990s Iraq?!

[Etain]

The US government releases country studies,which are exactly what they sound like.
The 1990 one for Iraq estimates the Assyrian population to be 133,000 at the time.
This doesn't sound right.

 

[Googoo]

Do you expect it to have been more?

 

[Etain]

Do you expect it to have been more?

Yes.
http://www.irinnews.org/report/61897/iraq-christians-live-in-fear-of-death-squads

The last Iraqi census, in 1987, counted 1.4 million Christians, but many left during the 1990s when economic sanctions were imposed on the country.

 

[Googoo]

Yes.
http://www.irinnews.org/report/61897/iraq-christians-live-in-fear-of-death-squads

I think the assyrian  or generally the Iraqi diaspora increased starting from the 90s because that's when the first gulf war happened and Iraq was leading it's second war. Iraq was fairly stable during its first war i.e. Iranian-Iraqi war but, people knew this second war would not bring good news and they were right. Naturally, it would've declined so low in the 90s and even lower post 2003 to something like 100,000s.

 

[Cascade]

A lot of us started to leave in the early 90s. But there was still over 800K (at least) of us left in Iraq at that time.

Yes, that figure doesn't sound right. There are still more than 200K Assyrians right now in Iraq I believe.