FRANCE-IRAQ-SYRIA-CONFLICT-IS-CULTURE

Iraqi friar Najeeb Michaeel, of the Roman Catholic Dominican Order, poses on May 22 , 2015 in Paris, at the Hotel de Soubise, where the national archives of the France are preserved. Najeeb Michaeel carried six boxes of documents dated between the 13th and 19th century across the border from Iraq into Kurdistan, to protect them from the systematic destruction of the non-Muslim cultural heritage by Daesh (IS). Copies of seven of these documents are currently being displayed at the National Archives in Paris at an exhibition entitled: "Mesopotamia, a crossroads of cultures." Michaeel's collection includes historical and philosophical texts, documents on both Christian and Muslim spirituality, music and literature written in Aramaic, Syriac, Arabic and Armenian. They bear testament to the long Christian tradition in former Mesopotamia -- seen as the cradle of western civilisation -- which survived even as most of the region between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers converted to Islam in the 7th century. AFP PHOTO / KENZO TRIBOUILLARD (Photo credit should read KENZO TRIBOUILLARD/AFP via Getty Images)