Thousands of Iraqi families with children have to live amid corpses and unexploded bombs in the only available accommodations left to them after the closure of refugee camps, an international NGO for children's rights said on Friday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 27th November, 2020) Thousands of Iraqi families with children have to live amid corpses and unexploded bombs in the only available accommodations left to them after the closure of refugee camps, an international NGO for children's rights said on Friday.
The Iraqi government has launched a large-scale initiative of returning around 250,000 people displaced during the war to their original places of residence. Camps hosting internally displaced persons across the country began shutting down as a result.
"Thousands of children and their families are forced to live in badly damaged houses in abandoned areas with unexploded bombs, dead bodies and rubble, after the sudden closure of several camps for displaced people in Iraq," Save the Children said in a press release.
The organization spoke to such families and found out they lacked such basic amenities as beds, electricity, clean water and food. Many multiple-member families pack into one single room due to the lack of adequate living space and the scarcity of heating means.
One of the parents the organization spoke to came back to Mosul from the Yahyawa camp in Kirkuk. He said their area used to be a stronghold of the Islamic State (terrorist organization, banned in Russia) and was full of weapons left behind by the terrorists.
Children, who mostly lack knowledge about weapons, often touch such dangerous weapons as unexploded grenades not understanding the danger, according to the press release. Parents of girls are also worried about the potential danger of them being kidnapped, the organization said.
"What's happening now is deeply concerning. Up to 49 percent of the affected people are children who have lived in difficult camp conditions for over three years, and are now forced to live in places no child should live in," Save the Children's Country Director in Iraq Ishtiaq Mannan was quoted as saying.
With the winter season approaching and the coronavirus pandemic still underway, the watchdog called on the Iraqi government to provide alternative shelter for displaced families who do not want to return to their destroyed areas of origin.
