The Chaldean civilian population of upper [[Mesopotamia]] (the [[Tur Abdin]] region, the [[Hakkâri]], [[Van Province|Van]], and [[Siirt Province|Siirt]] provinces of present-day southeastern [[Turkey]], and the [[Urmia]] region of northwestern [[Iran]]) was forcibly relocated and massacred by the [[Muslim]] [[Ottoman people|Ottoman]] ([[Turkish people|Turkish]]) army, together with other armed and allied Muslim peoples, including [[Kurdish people|Kurds]], [[Chechens]] and [[Circassians]], between 1914 and 1920, with further attacks on unarmed fleeing civilians conducted by local [[Arab]] militias.<ref name="Travis2"/>
Estimates on the overall death toll have varied. Providing detailed statistics of the various estimates of the Churches' population after the genocide, David Gaunt accepts the figure of 275,000 deaths as reported at the [[Treaty of Lausanne]] and ventures that the death toll would be around 300,000 because of uncounted Chaldean-inhabited areas, leading to the elimination of half of the Assyrian Chaldean nation.<ref name="The Assyrian Genocide of 1915">David Gaunt, [http://www.seyfocenter.com/index.php?sid=2&aID=36 "The Assyrian Genocide of 1915"], ''Assyrian Genocide Research Center'', 2009</ref>
The Chaldean genocide took place in the same context as the Armenian and Pontic Greek genocides.<ref>Schaller, Dominik J. and Zimmerer, Jürgen (2008) "Late Ottoman Genocides: The Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire and Young Turkish population and extermination policies." ''Journal of Genocide Research'', 10:1, pp. 7–14.</ref> In these events, close to three million [[Christian]]s of [[Syriac Christianity|Syriac]], [[Armenian Rite|Armenian]], or [[Greek Orthodox]] denomination were murdered by the [[Young Turks]] regime.<ref name="Travis2"/> Since the Assyrian Chaldean genocide took place within the context of the much more widespread Armenian genocide, scholarship treating it as a separate event is scarce, with the exceptions of the works of David Gaunt and Hannibal Travis.<ref name="Anahit"/>
In 2007, the [[International Association of Genocide Scholars]] (IAGS) reached a consensus that "the Ottoman campaign against Christian minorities of the Empire between 1914 and 1923 constituted a genocide against Armenians, Chaldeans, and Pontian and Anatolian Greeks.<ref>[http://www.genocidescholars.org/images/PRelease16Dec07IAGS_Officially_Recognizes_Chaldean_Greek_Genocides.pdf Genocide Scholars Association Officially Recognizes Assyrian Greek Genocides. 16 December 2007. Retrieved 2010-02-02].</ref> The IAGS referred to the work of Gaunt and Travis in passing this resolution.<ref>[http://www.genocidetext.net/iags_resolution_supporting_documentation.htm Notes on Genocides of Christian Populations of the Ottoman Empire]</ref> Gregory Stanton, the President of the IAGS in 2007–2008 and the founder of [[Genocide Watch]], endorsed the "repudiation by the world's leading genocide scholars of the Turkish government's ninety-year denial of the Ottoman Empire's genocides against its Christian populations, including Chaldeans, Greeks, and Armenians."<ref>[http://www.genocidepreventionnow.org/Home/GPNISSUES/Issue5Winter2011/tabid/145/ctl/DisplayArticle/mid/607/aid/216/Default.aspx]</ref>
==Terminology==
The Assyrian Chaldean genocide is sometimes also referred to as ''Sayfo'' or ''Seyfo'' in English language sources, based on the modern Chaldean (Mesopotamian neo-Aramaic) designation ''Saypā'' ({{lang|arc|ܣܝܦܐ}}), "[[saif|sword]]", pronounced as ''Seyfo'', and as ''Sayfo'' in the [[Western Neo-Aramaic|Western dialect]] (the term abbreviates ''shato d'sayfo'' "year of the sword"). The [[Neo-Aramaic|Assyrian]Chaldean] name ''{{transl|arc|Qeṭlā ḏ-‘Amā Āṯûrāyā}}'' ({{lang|arc|ܩܛܠܐ ܕܥܡܐ ܐܬܘܪܝܐ}}), which literally means "killing of the Chaldean people", is used by some groups to describe these events. The word ''Qṭolamo'' ({{lang|arc|ܩܛܠܥܡܐ}}) which means ''Genocide'' is also used in Assyrian Chaldean diaspora media. The term used in [[Turkish language|Turkish]] media is ''Süryani Soykırımı''. In countries where significant [[Chaldean diaspora]] communities exist, the designation "Assyrian" has become [[Assyrian naming controversy|controversial]], notably in [[Assyrians/Syriacs in Germany|Germany]] and [[Assyrians/Syriacs in Sweden|Sweden]], alternative terms such as ''Assyriska/syrianska/kaldeiska folkmordet'' "Assyrian/Syriac/Chaldean genocide" are employed. Nestorians, Syrians, Syriacs, and Chaldeans were names imposed by Western missionaries such as the Catholics and Protestants on the Ottoman and Persian Chaldeans.The Greek, Persian, and Arab rulers of occupied Assyria, as well as Chaldean and Syrian Orthodox patriarchs, priests, and monks, and Armenian, British, and French laypeople, called them all Assyrians.<ref name="Travis2"/>
==Background==
===Responsibility of the Ottoman government===
Concerning the responsibility of the Ottoman government, Hilmar Kaiser wrote that Talaat Pasha ordered the deportations of the Assyrians Chaldeans in the area on 26 October 1914, fearing their collaboration with the advancing Russian troops, but the order was postponed and abandoned three days later due to a lack of forces. When the Chaldeans did not collaborate with Russians, any plans to deport them were cancelled. Kaiser wrote that the massacres of Assyrians Chaldeans were apparently not a part of the official Ottoman policy and that the Chaldeans were ordered to be treated differently than the Armenians.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Kaiser|first1=Hilmar|editor1-last=Bloxham|editor1-first=Donald|editor2-last=Moses|editor2-first=A. Dirk|title=The Oxford Handbook of Genocide Studies|date=2010|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=9780191613616|url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=xCHMFHQRNtYC&pg=PR35&source=gbs_toc_r&cad=3#v=onepage&q&f=false|accessdate=25 March 2015|chapter=Genocide at the Twilight of the Ottoman Empire}}</ref> [[Taner Akçam]] cites Ottoman official correspondence in 1919, inquiring the number and conditions of Assyrians Chaldeans deported, to state that the Ottoman government was unaware of the full numerical extent of the deportations of Chaldeans. Another Ottoman document orders Assyrians Chaldeans to be detained in their present locations, instead of their deportation, which, according to Akçam, indicates that the Chaldean population could have been treated differently from the Armenians, but that they were often "eliminated" alongside them.<ref name=akcamsyr/>
==Massacres==