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Children Hardest Hit by Humanitarian Crisis in Iraq
By Jonathan Steele
The number of Iraqi children who are
born underweight or suffer from
malnutrition has increased sharply since
the US-led invasion, according to a
report by Oxfam and a network of about
80 aid agencies.
The report describes a nationwide
catastrophe, with around 8 million
Iraqis - almost a third of the
population - in need of emergency aid.
Many families have dropped out of the
food rationing system because they have
been displaced by fighting and sectarian
conflict. Others suffer from the
collapse in basic services caused by the
exodus of doctors and hospital staff.
Although the security crisis forced
Oxfam and other agencies to withdraw
their foreign staff from Iraq to Jordan
within a year of the invasion, many
Iraqi non-governmental organisations
still work in the country and receive
supplies from abroad.
“The fighting and weak institutions mean
there are severe limits on what
humanitarian work can be carried out,”
said Jeremy Hobbs, the director of Oxfam
International, yesterday as the report,
Rising to the Humanitarian Challenge in
Iraq, was published.
But, the report says, more could and
should be done to help the Iraqi people.
The Iraqi government, in particular,
could do more. It should double cash
payments for the 1 million families
headed by widows from the current $100
(about £49) a month. Nine of every 10
conflict-related deaths since 2003 have
been of men, and earlier wars and
repression also left many families
without a male breadwinner.
At least 4 million Iraqis depend on food
assistance, but a third of those who
have had to flee their homes in the last
year cannot get subsidised rations
because they are not registered in a new
home. The report urges the government to
give the homeless temporary identity
cards to allow them to get food.
It calls on western donor governments,
which have shifted money out of
humanitarian assistance towards
reconstruction, to reverse that trend.
Most development projects have been
forced to slow down or stop anyway,
whereas aid money can be spent
effectively - and the need is dire.
Forty-three percent of Iraqis are in
“absolute poverty”, partly because of a
50% unemployment rate. Basic services in
2003 were poor after a decade of
sanctions and under-investment by the
Saddam Hussein regime. But they have
worsened since. The number of Iraqis
without access to adequate water
supplies, for example, has risen from
50% in 2003 to 70% now.
Eighty percent lack effective
sanitation, and diarrhoeal diseases have
increased. Most homes in Baghdad and
other cities have only two hours of
electricity a day.
Children are suffering the most, with
92% showing learning difficulty because
of the pervasive climate of fear. More
than 800,000 have dropped out of school,
because they now live in camps for the
displaced or because schools have had to
be taken over to shelter the homeless.
Around 40% of Iraq’s teachers, water
engineers, medical staff and other
professionals have left the country
since 2003.
The Oxfam report comes as Unicef and the
UN agency for refugees jointly appealed
for $129m to help to get tens of
thousands of uprooted Iraqi children
back to school. Saying a generation of
Iraqis could grow up uneducated and
alienated, the agencies presented a plan
to support Syria, Jordan, Egypt and
Lebanon in providing schooling for
155,000 refugees. Altogether, more than
2 million Iraqis have fled to nearby
countries. About 500,000 of them are of
school age and most currently have
limited or no access to education.
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