ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – As the ceasefire deal in northern Syria brokered by the United States and Turkey comes to an end on Tuesday, the Kurdistan Region of Iraq is braced for a fresh wave of potentially tens of thousands of refugees.
Hoshang Mohamed Abdulrahman, Director General of the Joint Crisis Coordination Centre (JCC) at the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Ministry of Interior, told Rudaw English on Tuesday the Region will struggle to manage such a huge number of refugees without international assistance.
“As expected, the crisis in Syria will definitely impact the Kurdistan Region and it will have huge consequences. Right now we are facing new waves of refugees,” Abdulrahman said.
“As the situation continues to escalate and worsen in this region, we expect a quarter of a million people will be fleeing into the Kurdistan Region in the worst case scenario. This is an additional burden to our already depleted capacity.”
Some 165,000 people have been displaced from the towns and villages along Syria’s northern border with Turkey since Ankara launched its offensive on October 10.
The United Nations and aid agencies are laying plans to accept 50,000 Syrians into the Kurdistan Region of Iraq in the coming months, according to the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC).
In the last 24 hours alone, some 1,736 Syrian refugees have crossed into the Region – the highest number to arrive in a single day since the Turkish operation began.
The KRG and aid agencies have established reception centers on the shared border linking Kurdish-controlled northeast Syria and the Iraqi Kurdish province of Duhok. From there, families are being bussed to camps in Domiz and Bardarash.
“We’re seeing hundreds arriving into Iraq every day and we expect more to arrive, not only because of the fighting but also because of the fear of what is going to happen next,” said NRC’s Iraq Country Director Rishana Haniffa on Tuesday.
“Syrians who wish to cross to safety in Iraq must be allowed to do so, without any delay.”
The JCC director general said the KRG is working with aid agencies to respond to the crisis.
“We are exerting all of our efforts that we have at the regional level, within our departments and ministries. We are coordinating with our partners like UN agencies … to mobilize the required funds and resources for implementing the contingency plan we have developed for this influx of Syrian refugees,” he said.
“Currently we have been able to manage the first influx of Syrian refugees, but we are concerned beyond that if we receive thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands, then it will be a really big burden and very difficult for us to do it alone,” Abdulrahman said.
The Kurdistan Region of Iraq is already hosting around a quarter of a million Syrian refugees who fled earlier bouts of violence in neighboring Syria. It is also home to tens of thousands of internally displaced persons from Iraqi provinces impacted by the war with the Islamic State (ISIS).
“Still we are hosting 791,000 Iraqi IDPs in the Kurdistan Region and also the 237,000 Syrian refugees that fled to the Kurdistan Region from 2012 onward,” the director general said, pointing out that many have been unable to return to their homes owing to security threats and a lack of services.
“The IDPs want to return, but many of them are coming back to our camps in the Kurdistan Region,” he said.
“For instance, this year we have received over 6,400 IDPs who want to return, but due to money reasons they are coming back, leaving their homes or areas, like absence of security protection, especially after the ISIS activities in these areas and then the absence of services, livelihoods, job opportunities. So these people cannot survive after they return,” Abdulrahman added.
