[NYTr] 2.2 Million Displaced Iraqis Running Out of Places to Go

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

NOTE: Juan Cole will be on CSpan-2 Sunday night, 9/9/07:

My talk on Napoleon's Egypt will be shown in the US on CSPAN-2 at
10 pm EDT on Sunday evening, September 9.



Informed Comment - Sep 9, 2007
http://www.juancole.com/2007/09/22-million-internally-displaced-iraqis.html


2.2 Million Internally Displaced Iraqis;

Sadrists Warn US on Basra;
37 Killed in Bombings, Shootings Saturday

by Juan Cole

The Sadr Movement in Basra is warning the US military not to try to
come into the province to replace the departing British troops.
Suspected Mahdi Army roadside bombs have inflicted unusually high
casualties on British troops in the deep south this year.

The International Organization for Migration is reporting that its data
show that 2.2 million Iraqis have been kicked out of their homes by
threats and violence, about half of them since the February, 2006,
bombing of the Askariya Shrine in Samarra.

That is, 1.1 million Iraqis have been forced to flee their
neighborhoods for other places in Iraq in the past 18 months, which is
an average of 61,000 per month. But in fact, the rate was a bit less
than that in 2006, and accelerated to 100,000 a month beginning in
February, 07. That's right. More displaced people by far since the
troop escalation began. What is worse, there are fewer and fewer places
for them to go. The Sunni Arab provinces are very dangerous. So you'd
go to the Shiite areas, which are mostly quieter. But 11 of 15
provinces in central-south Iraq have put restrictions on immigration
from other provinces! It is like it already isn't one country (inside
your own country surely you can live in any province you like).

KUNA reports:

    IOM says 2.2 mn Iraqis internally displaced

    GENEVA, Sept 7 (KUNA) -- A new report issued by the International
Organization for Migration (IOM) says nore than 2.2 million Iraqis were
internally displaced.

    IOM spokesperson Jean-Philippe Chauzy said that data . . .
estimates that the number of persons displaced since the bombing of the
Al-Askari Shrine in Samarra on February 22, 2006 to be 1,011,870
individuals.

    This figure combined with the 1.2 million individuals who were
internally displaced before February 22, results in a total of over 2.2
million Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Iraq to date, he said.

    According to Chauzy, eleven out of fifteen central and southern
governorates are now severely restricting the entry and registration of
IDPs. . .


Sawt al-Iraq reports that 2,000 Iraqis are fleeing into Syria every
day. That's 730,000 a year! Syria is reaffirming that it will require
visas, so this flow may taper off. Otherwise, about 35 years, and the
Iraq problem would be solved; no Iraqis left there.

And you wonder why the Pentagon's figures for 'sectarian conflict' are
falling. Most of those fleeing are Sunni Arabs. [A kind reader
corrected this; Sunnis are over 30% of those fleeing to Syria; I think
they would be higher among those fleeing to Jordan.] Since February 15
when the troop escalation got underway, 420,000 Iraqis would have gone
to Syria alone at that rate, 120,000 of them Sunnis. There were only 5
million or so Sunni Arabs. Then we have the 600,000 internally
displaced since February, the proportion of Sunnis among them being not
specified. It is probably the case that nearly 10 percent of Sunni
Arabs are no longer living in the same neighborhoods as they were just
this past January! A lot of mixed neighborhoods are obviously much
quieter; nobody here but us Shiites, boss. And lots of Shiites gone
from Sunni neighborhoods.

Robert Reid of AP confirms that many mixed neighborhoods in Iraq are
now monochrome. He also confirms that nearly 1/5 of US troops killed
this year in Iraq were killed in al-Anbar Province, which isn't as
quiet as Fred Kagan thinks it is.

Al-Hayat reports in Arabic that 37 Iraqis were killed in bombings or
shootings on Saturday.

Reuters reports that: "Police said a parked car exploded near a police
station in Baghdad's Shi'ite area of Sadr City at dusk, when people
were shopping. The blast killed 15 people and wounded 45, they said."

McClatchy adds: "11 unidentified bodies were found in Baghdad today by
Iraqi Police. 1 in Sadr City, 1 in Ur, 1 in New Baghdad, 2 in Amil, 2
in Hurriyah, 1 in Jami'a, 1 in Saidiyah and 2 in Bayaa."

and

"Tikrit - 2 civilians killed in IED explosion in Dor district, this
evening."

Reuters reports other civil war violence on Saturday:

    [KUFA] - A roadside bomb exploded in a market in the holy Shi'ite
town of Kufa, killing five people and wounding eight, a police official
said. . . [Near the shrine of Muslim bin `Aqil]

    NAJAF - Gunmen killed an official in the office of Shi'ite cleric
Moqtada al-Sadr, Mohammed al-Gara'awi, on Friday in front of his house
in northern Najaf, 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.

    KIRKUK - A car bomb exploded near a police station in the Shi'ite
Turkmen town of Basheer, 20 km (12 miles) southwest of Kirkuk, police
said. One police source said one policeman was killed, while a second
said two died. Police said Turkmen residents launched a revenge attack
on the Sunni town of Albu-Faraj, burning six houses.

    KIRKUK - Police found two bodies with gunshot wounds and signs of
torture in a small town north of Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of
Baghdad, police said. . .

    DAQUQ - Four bodies, including one of a woman, were found with
gunshot wounds in Daquq, 45 km (28 miles) south of Kirkuk, police
said. . .

    AL-ZAB - Gunmen killed three people in a drive-by shooting in
Al-Zab, 35 km (20 miles) southwest of northern Kirkuk, on Friday,
police said . . .

    MOSUL - Gunmen killed three policemen in a drive-by shooting on
Friday in eastern Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, police
said. . .


                              ***


sent by Steven Robinson (activ-l)

Reuters - Sep 7, 2007
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L07155021.htm


Many displaced Iraqis left with no place to go-IOM

Reuters

Geneva - Most of Iraq's provinces are severely restricting entry to
people fleeing violence and lawlessness, leaving some displaced
families "without a place to go", an international aid agency said on
Friday.

The restrictions in 11 of Iraq's 18 governorates make it harder for
Iraqis fleeing violence to move within the country to seek safety, the
International Organisation for Migration said.

Many of the more than 2.2 million internally displaced persons (IDPs)
within Iraq cannot access shelter and other basic services, while
neighbouring Syria is joining Jordan in imposing tighter visa
restrictions, the IOM said.

"The vast majority of (Iraqi) governorates have now closed their doors
to newly displaced persons... Their fate is more and more difficult,"
spokesman Jean-Philippe Chauzy told a briefing.

Rafiq Tschannen, IOM's Iraq chief of mission, said: "Entry and
registration restrictions imposed by most governorates and stricter
visa restrictions said to soon be imposed by Syria and Jordan for Iraqi
refugees could mean Iraqis who remain inside the country will be
effectively marooned without a place to go."

Many provinces or governorates -- ranging from Babylon in largely Sunni
Muslim central Iraq to Kerbala, Najaf and Basra in the largely Shi'ite
Muslim south and all three semi-autonomous Kurdish provinces in the
north -- have restricted entry and registration, according to the IOM's
latest report.

In the southern governorates, entry is "increasingly restricted due to
security concerns and the strain displacement is placing on local
capacities," it said.

People entering these southern provinces are frequently only registered
if they originate from there or can prove family ties to the area, it
said. Inability to register prevents people from transferring their
food cards and accessing basic services.

In the western Anbar province there are no official restrictions but
"the intensity of inter-tribal conflict requires IDPs to have tribal
ties to an area in order to stay there", the IOM said.

More than a million of the 2.2 million internal refugees have been
uprooted since the bombing of a Shi'ite shrine in the town of Samarra
in early 2006, which sparked a wave of sectarian violence that has
killed tens of thousands of Iraqis.

IOM's report was based on an assessment of more than 111,000 displaced
families, or some 670,000 people, who had fled since the bombing. Some
70 percent of the displaced had fled Baghdad.

Syria's government has issued a decree taking effect on Monday which
bars Iraqi passport holders from entering the country, except for
businessmen and academics, a small minority of the 3,000-5,000 who
currently cross the border every day.