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| Iraq |
| Migration ministry post no longer important for Kurds: Former minister |
| 2019-05-10 |
| [Rudaw] Former Iraqi Minister of Displacement and Migration Darbaz Mohammed in an interview with Rudaw on May 5 says that post is no longer of "great importance" for Kurds, because a large number of the IDPs have now returned. Additionally, many of IDPs who took shelter in Kirkuk during the ISIS conflict also have returned and conditions in Shingal are not suitable for IDPs to return because of the presence of several armed militias. Rudaw, Nawzad Mahmoud: Kurds did not retain the post of the minister of displacement and migration in the new Iraqi cabinet, yet there are a large number of IDPs sheltered in the Kurdistan Region. Do you think it was important for Kurds to keep the post? Darbaz Mohammed: All the ministries the Kurds received are more important than the migration ministry. This is particularly now so that half of the IDPs have returned home. The Ministry of Displacement and Migration is no longer of great importance for Kurds. Besides, the good relations we forged with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) are maintained by the current team [in Baghdad]. During the ISIS conflict, you were criticized for the lack of help in assisting Iraqi IDPs sheltering in the Kurdistan Region. The complaints had two sides. Sometimes it was political, in the sense that we had only relied on ourselves to take care of the IDPs and Baghdad had not assisted us. The other point of view was that there was not much understanding about our limited resources. For example, if you have 200,000 IDPs, you cannot build 200,000 residence units. Having one million displaced persons in Kurdistan was a heavy burden. What we offered was the best we managed to do. What did you do? In the beginning when we assumed the post, we started to build camps. Within the first two months of our work, we built 20 residential units in Duhok. We later handled djinn-infested Mosul ... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn... affairs too, in coordination with the Kurdistan Region and the Iraqi government. We were working hard and I remember, even [US President Barack] Obama at the time, was asking what had been done for Mosul as everyone had been talking about the process of the liberation of Mosul from ISIS. Even the United Nations ...a formerly good idea gone bad... informed us that if we had managed to shelter half a million IDPs from Mosul, then we would score a huge success. Yet, they were adamant we would not be able to do it. But we proved that we sheltered even more than that number. Did they talk about the financial burdens of the IDPs? No. The funding responsibilities were not on the KRG's shoulders. The pressure [on the KRG] was only on health and electricity. The Iraqi government and organizations were funding and paying cash. Is it an easy task to help the people of Shingal return home? With the current situation on the ground, no. The matter is not just vested in the KRG. The PKK [Kurdistan Workers’ Party] and their affiliate groups are another problem. You once said that more than 500,000 Arab IDPs had fled to Kirkuk. Do you know whether or not they have returned to their areas? Correct. A large number of IDPs had fled to Kirkuk from Anbar, Mosul, and Hawija. A large number of them have already returned. Maybe some of them have opted to stay. On the issue of demography, they will not become a threat as their food ration cards are not from Kirkuk. Some of the ISIS families displaced to Syria were from Iraq. We returned around 30,000 Iraqis from Syria. There is an abundant number still lingering there. They are the children and families of ISIS. The repatriation of them is problematic because how can you protect them? You cannot put a child behind bars just because his father was an ISIS member. What is his crime because his father was ISIS? |
| Posted by:trailing wife |