a border between Russia and Persia. The second was as a result of the Assyrian genocide during and after World War I; the third was after World War II, when the Soviet Union unsuccessfully tried to establish a satellite state in Iran. Soviet troops withdrew in 1946, and left the Assyrians (who supported the coup) exposed to retaliation identical to that received from the Turks 30 years earlier. Soviet authorities persecuted Assyrian religious and community leaders in the same way that they persecuted Russians who remained members of the Russian Orthodox Church. Although Assyrians tended to assimilate into the Armenian community in the Soviet Union, their cultural identity found new expression under glasnost. Most Assyrians are members of the Assyrian Church of the East; other churches include the Syriac Orthodox Church and the Chaldean Catholic Church. USSR census 1897 census: 5,300 "Assyrians" (by language) 1919 refugee status: 7,000–8,000 Assyrian refugees in Tbilisi 2,000 Assyrians in Yerevan 15,000 Assyrians from Hakkari, 10,000 from Urmia and Salmas in the Russian region of Rostov 1926 census: 9,808 Assyrians (Aisor) 1959 census: 21,083 Assyrians 1970 census: 24,294 Assyrians 1979 census: 25,170 Assyrians 1989 census: 26,289 Assyrians Russia 1989 census: 9,600 Assyrians, of whom 4,742 spoke the Syriac language; 1,738 in the Krasnodar region 2002 census: 13,649 Assyrians (ассирийцы) Armenia 1926 (Soviet) census: 21,215 Assyrians 1989 (Soviet) census: 5,963 Assyrians 2001 census: 3,409 Assyrians (3rd minority ethnic group after Yazidis and Russians): 524 urban, 2,485 rural 2011 census: 2,769 Assyrians Georgia 1926 census: 2,904 Assyrians 1989 census: 6,206 Assyrians 2002 census: 3,299 Assyrians Ukraine 2001 census: 3,143 Kazakhstan 2005 estimates: 540 (270 in Almaty) Lebanon North America Canada 2001 Census: 6,980 Assyrians 2006 Census: 8,650 2011 Census: 10,810 United States 1990 census: 46,099 Assyrians 19,066 born in the U.S. 16,783 arrived before 1980. 10,250 from 1980 to 1990 27,494 listed Syriac as the "Language Spoken at Home" Unemployment: 9.1 Percent 2000 census: 82,355 Assyrians/Chaldeans/Syrians 34,484 in Michigan: Sterling Heights: 5,515 (4.4 percent of the city) West Bloomfield: 4,874 (7.5 percent) Southfield: 3,684 (4.7 percent) Warren: 2,625 (1.9 percent) Farmington Hills 2,499 (3 percent) Troy: 2,047 (2.5 percent) Detroit, Michigan 1,963 (0.2 percent) Oak Park 1,864 (6.3 percent) Madison Heights: 1,428 (4.6 percent) Orchard Lake Village: 241 (10.9 percent) 22,671 in California: 15,685 in Illinois Chicago: 7,121 (0.2 percent) Niles, Illinois: 3,410 (3.3 percent) Maine Park: 1,035 (0.8 percent) Syriac speakers: 46,932 South America Uruguay According