Assyrian Diaspora Lobbies for Change from CA

April 24, 2004

Source: The Los Angeles Garment and Citizen

http://news.ncmonline.com/news/view_article.html?article_id=074c9392c49e003dfab8455e3919d660

On April 24, 2004 The Los Angeles Garment and Citizen published a profile of Pierre Toulakany, a Los Angeles property owner who traces his family roots to the Assyrians, an ethnic Christian group located primarily in modern day Iraq. "The waves of Assyrians immigrants to the U.S. first established significant population centers in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts. There are currently about 600,000 Assyrian Americans in the U.S., with roughly 15,000 in the Los Angeles area. The local population counts North Hollywood as a cultural center, with many homeowners spread through the rest of the San Fernando Valley. The earliest immigrants formed the Assyrian-American National Federation in 1932, a group dedicated to lobbying the U.S. government and providing food, medicine and other relief to comrades in Iraq. Toulakany took on a major role during the resettlements of the 1970s, providing the driving force for the formation of the Assyrian Universal Alliance Foundation. It’s one of many organizations Toulakany has helped found or support, and he guided it through its early years while also serving as national president of the Assyrian-American National Federation from 1974 to 1976."