Special report on IDPs

PART ONE OVERVIEW With an estimated 900,000 internally displaced people (IDPs) in Iraq, humanitarian organisations are putting the emphasis on providing proper shelter in the coming year for homeless people uprooted by the troubles that have plagued the country not only over the past year but the past few decades. Of this figure the majority, some 400,000 live in what are called 'collective towns' or purpose built settlements. Another 300,000 live in homes and the rest are in government or other types of accommodation. While there are no current accurate statistics at present, based on pre-war figures, the largest population of between 600,000 and 800,000 IDPs are living in the north with up to an estimated 100,000 in the south and centre, many with limited access to basic facilities. Prior to the second Gulf War a UN Habitat survey found that 40 percent of the displaced had no access to health care and that only some 57,000 people were living in adequate housing. With some signs of IDPs returning following the fall of Saddam Hussein, as of the beginning of June 2003, the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has confirmed up to 40,000 registered IDPs in the south and central governorates, with other sources suggesting up to 75,000. Aid agencies say that although some IDPs have returned home it is very difficult to establish exact figures due to a lack of staff on the ground because of insecurity. Today, Iraq is struggling to give hundreds of thousands of IDPs a roof over their heads as the situation of insecurity continues to be of major concern. In this IRIN special 2 part report on IDPs, we look into the past and present situation of displaced people in a country which potentially has a very uncertain future. SITUATION IN THE NORTH After 12 years of autonomy it would be easy to think that the north of Iraq, known as Kurdistan by most of its residents, had fewer problems than the south and centre of the country which continued to endure Saddam's regime until earlier this year. But the reality is that the three northern governorates of Mosul, Arbil and Dahuk still have huge problems and needs - none bigger than somehow solving the situation of between 600,000 and 800,000 IDPs, with the cities of Mosul and Kirkuk being home to the largest numbers. The problems have existed for decades, but the last 20 years have seen the worst displacement in the north. First there was the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war when Kurds were expelled to Iran and people fled border areas as fighting intensified. Then came Saddam Hussein's Arabisation campaign and suppression of uprisings forcing not only Kurds but Turkmens and Assyrians out of their homes. The programme saw Arabs from southern and central Iraq induced to move north to Kurdish cities. Frequently Kurds were kicked out of their homes to make way for the new arrivals. At the end of the war with Iran, Saddam launched the horrific Anfal campaign that saw villages burnt and bulldozed as punishment for the Kurds' resistance. His authorities relocated hundreds of thousands of villagers to collective towns that were little better than concentration camps according to inhabitants. Unable to leave the towns and with no access to arable land, Saddam had destroyed the people's livelihoods and made them economically dependent on the regime in Baghdad. But even the establishment of a Kurdish government following the 1991 uprising did little to stop new IDPs being created. Internal fighting between the two main Kurdish parties, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP) as well as battles along the Turkish border by the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) with Turkish military, all saw more people forced from their homes. Ironically, the war this year that toppled Saddam Hussein's regime did not result in the huge new numbers of IDPs that were feared. Those who did leave their homes before or during the fighting returned relatively quickly. But what the war did precipitate was a hope for thousands of mainly Kurdish IDPs that they could at last return to their villages, towns and cities and rebuild their homes and lives. And in doing so it clearly showed the scale of the problem. For so many people returning home, there were no resources to rebuild their lives. Therefore as the first snows of winter hit the region, thousands of families are living in tents or in mud hovels. Manija Mohammed Sayeed has been an IDP for 16 years, displaced three times and is still no closer to returning to her home let alone finding a house to live in. Squatting outside the mud shelter she lives in at the former international sports stadium in the northern Iraq city of Kirkuk, she said having hope is hard, especially when the memories of recent years hurt so much. In 1988 she was evicted from her village of Qaitool south of Kirkuk as part of Saddam Hussein's Anfal campaign that destroyed 4,500 villages in the Kurdish north of the country. The rest of her family and villagers disappeared and were killed. Eventually she got a job near Tikrit but was imprisoned and evicted from there to a collective village near Kirkuk set up by Saddam's authorities. Life here was miserable and as soon as the Iraqi regime collapsed in April, she shifted back to Kirkuk, ending up living in the sports stadium with over 1,000 other IDPs. While the Kurdistan Regional Government, United Nations and NGOs have reconstructed many villages, the problem is still vast as Brandon Pustejovsky of US NGO Mission East told IRIN in the northern governorate of Arbil, it was not just a matter of building houses for those returning to their homes. Rather, an entire package was needed which included schools, health facilities, water and sanitation and a means to make a living for the residents. In the village of Ekmala an hour's drive from the northern city of Dahuk, Mission East has built 32 homes for residents whose village was destroyed in the Anfal campaign. But it is just one village among hundreds that still need reconstruction and help. "I just wish we could provide that comprehensive a solution to more villages," Pustejovsky said. Fakher Maraan, the Kurdistan Regional Government's Deputy Minister of Reconstruction and Development, told IRIN in Arbil that the IDP situation was by far the biggest problem his government faced. Nearly 200,000 IDPs in the north were still living in the collective towns they had been shifted to by Saddam's regime. In Arbil governorate and nearby Kirkuk alone there were more than 45,000 IDP families. Maraan estimated another 1,500 villages needed to be rebuilt across the north of Iraq to accommodate them. But he also stressed the need for long term solutions not just emergency help to provide food and shelter for families. While a simple house could cost about US $4,000, when costs of water, sewage, power, roads, health centres and schools were added in, the price per residence in a reconstructed village could rise to US $12,000 or US $15,000 in remote regions. While the north had many skills and resources, it needed help from abroad because the problem was so vast, he said. However, he worried that the international community considered the north of Iraq was comparatively well off after years of self-government. "But I have a very bad message for them - they don't understand." He said the UN administered Oil-for-Food Programme had given people hope that they could return to their place of origin, but many were finding there was no help despite the new freedoms. On the outskirts of Arbil, thousands of people still live in the collective town of Binaslawa. Ali Hamid was kicked out of his village of Khalid Barziani in 1988 by Saddam's forces and moved to Binaslawa. Formerly a farmer, he was forced to sell second hand clothes to survive. Fifteen years later he is still there, now with a small store selling cigarettes and sweets. He has visited his village but everything remains destroyed. At present he lives hand to mouth and has no way of paying to rebuild his old life. So he waits in Binaslawa for someone to provide him with somewhere to live and a way to make a living. "I would love to go back to my village to live and I still hope to be able to - until I die I hope to go back. It is my land and the land of my father and grandfather." One of 80,000 IDPs living in Binaslawa, he is luckier than many. Thousands have no income and live in tents or mud shacks. They rely totally on the monthly food distributions under the Oil-for-Food Programme now being administered by the new Iraqi ruling authority backed by the US Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA). Robert Pianka of US NGO Mercy Corps told IRIN in Khanaqin near Arbil that there was almost an infinite variety of IDPs, from people whose villages had been destroyed during the Anfal campaign to those whose paperwork had not been in order way back in the 1960s. He said a related issue was the natural urbanisation process with people migrating from rural areas to towns and others moving from towns to cities. In this respect he said much of the IDP problem would not be solved by providing rural land to people but apartments and jobs in urban areas. Often there was not enough land in villages for expanded families and people wanted access to better schools and other kinds of employment. "People are moving from their villages to Khanaqin and from Khanaqin to Baghdad and they should be able to if they want to come and have a more prosperous life." He said Khanaqin was an example of an area with a mixed Arab and Kurdish population where relations between the two groups had traditionally been good. The Arabisation process had "messed around with this" and the return of IDPs was a way to re-establish what was a natural buffer zone between the Kurdish north and Arab south. However, further to the north the spectre of continuing IDP problems raised its head recently. At a protest of several thousand people in Kirkuk, marchers called for Arabs who had shifted to the city during the Arabisation process to leave and go home. In a country that has seen so many forced from their homes and so much suffering because of this, it appears the sad story of displacement may be set to continue unless large amounts of international reconstruction aid are forthcomming. Part Two