Iraqi Refugees - Iraq War

Iraq War

Refugees from Iraq have increased in number since the US-led invasion into Iraq in March 2003. An estimated 1.6-2.0 million people have fled the country. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimated in a report released in November 2006 that more than 1.6 million Iraqis had left Iraq since March 2003, nearly 7 percent of the total population. The BBC on 22 January 2007 placed the refugee figure at 2 million. By 16 February 2007, António Guterres, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, said that the external refugee number reached 2 million and that within Iraq there are an estimated 1.7 million internally displaced people. The refugee traffic out of the country has increased since the intensification of civil war.

As of June 21, 2007, the UNHCR estimated that over 4.2 million Iraqis have been displaced, with 2 million within the Iraq and 2.2 million in neighboring countries.

Most ventured to Jordan and Syria, creating demographic shifts that have worried both governments. A fear persisted in both countries, and others hosting sizable Iraqi refugee populations, that sectarian tensions would spill over amongst the exiles. These refugees were estimated to have been leaving Iraq at a rate of 3000-per-day by December 2006.

As many as 110,000 Iraqis could be targeted as collaborators because of their work for coalition forces. A May 25, 2007 article notes that in the past seven months only 69 people from Iraq have been granted refugee status in the United States. Roughly 40% of Iraq's middle class is believed to have fled, the U.N. said. Most are fleeing systematic persecution and have no desire to return. Refugees are mired in poverty as they are generally barred from working in their host countries. In Syria alone an estimated 50,000 Iraqi girls and women, many of them widows, are forced into prostitution just to survive.