UN Provides Shelter for Refugees in Anbar

Among Markazi camp’s new residents is 23-year-old Rawa, her husband and three children, who fled Ramadi four months ago.

“Lacking a sponsor, Rawa’s family has not been granted access to Baghdad though her husband Mohammed who suffers from serious eye problems, is allowed to cross the bridge to seek medical treatment in the city,” according to the refugee agency.

“In any event, we wouldn’t be able to afford living there,” Rawa was quoting as saying.

There are currently some 3.2 million internally displaced Iraqis spread across 3,000 different locations across the country, according to the refugee agency, adding that Anbar province hosts the largest number of those uprooted – some 580,000 or 18 percent of the total displaced population.

The humanitarian situation is worsening dramatically as the crisis in Iraq has accelerated since last year, when militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria [also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or ISIL] took over large portions of Iraq.

UN humanitarian officials have warned that 10 million Iraqis, or a quarter of the population, are going to need humanitarian aid by year’s end amid “dramatically” worsening conditions that are forcing many people to leave their homeland because they no longer see a future inside their country.

(Source: United Nations News Centre)