sentences:  In 1948, Shimun met with the representatives of Iraq, Syria and Iran in Washington, subsequently calling upon his followers to "live as loyal citizens wherever they resided in the Middle East" and relinquishing his role as a temporal leader and the nationalistic role of the church.This left a power vacuum in Assyrian politics that was filled by the Assyrian Universal Alliance in 1968.The seat of the Assyrian Church of the East remained in the United States even during the times of Patriarch Mar Dinkha IV.