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Content View Hits : 847411| Doors Closing on Iraqi Displaced |
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| Wednesday, 10 October 2007 14:05 | |||
 An increasing number of Iraqi provinces are refusing entry to refugees fleeing violence in other parts of the country, the UN refugee agency has warned.
In an interview with the BBC, Mr Harper said Iraqi authorities had been overwhelmed by the scope of the internal refugee problem and did not have the resources to cope.
He said the governors of up to 11 provinces - out of 18 in the country - had reacted to the crisis by blocking internal migrants from entering their territory, or denying them food and education if they do get in. "We are seeing an increasing number of governorates closing their borders or restricting entry to new arrivals," he said. "And so we have a pressure cooker building up inside Iraq - there is no imminent end to the displacement," he added.
Mr Harper said the UNHCR had raised the problem with the Iraqi central government in Baghdad, but it was told that local authorities had been urged not to turn away Iraqis fleeing other parts of the country. The 4.4m Iraqi refugees fleeing the violence and turmoil in the country, Mr Harper said, were the biggest challenge facing the UNHCR and the international community at the moment. He said the figures were increasing on average by up to 100,000 every month. In Diyala province, local aid workers have said they have been unable to reach thousands of families, including displaced refugees, because of the serious security situation. Mr Harper's warning comes at a time when Iraq's neighbours have more or less closed their borders to Iraqi refugees, saying they can no longer cope with the strain on their resources.
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