IOM says Iraqi displaced people suffer from traumas

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said thousands of displaced Iraqis from Mosul are still suffering from severe psychological trauma and nervous breakdowns, weeks after the town was re-routed because of the violence and suffering they suffered during three years under control.

Thousands of Iraqi refugees displaced during their government’s war against Islamic State militants are suffering psychological ramifications despite the recapture of their city more than one month ago, the United Nations said.

“Weeks after the retaking of Mosul city, many internally displaced persons (IDPs) are exhibiting signs of stress and anxiety,” the International Organization for Migration said in a report on Tuesday. The organization said children, in particular, have suffered the severest aftershock, and would need “long-term psychological support”, as the report put it.

The organization, highlighting psychological support it provides to 24,399 internally displaced Iraqis since the start of Mosul crisis in 2016, said that “amongst the many children IOM works with, those from Mosul tend to display symptoms of developmental regression, exhibited by episodes of bed-wetting, severe anxiety, apathy and quickness to get angry or cry.”

The war against Islamic State in Iraq has displaced more than four million people since January 2014. A campaign launched in October 2016 to retake Mosul, Islamic State’s former capital in the country, had displaced more than 900.000, according to government and U.N figures.

Throughout their occupation of several Iraqi cities, Islamic State militants tortured, executed and enslaved thousands of Iraqis, using some as human shields and shooting others once attempting to flee their havens, according to the government, local and international agencies. The Iraqi government said early July it retook Mosul from IS, and has said it would proceed towards other holdouts.

In the same context,  a convoy of internally displaced persons (IDPs) totaling 200 families has returned to Sadiyah, adding to the more than 200,000 people who have already returned to Iraq’s Diyala governorate. “It’s been nearly three and a half years we have been refugees. We lost our houses and land,” a Sadiyah resident told Rudaw upon their return on Sunday
 
The returnees consisted of Kurdish, Arabic and Turkmen families. The locals in Sadiyah said their main concerns are rebuilding homes, restoring services, receiving compensation, and security. The town is located on the eastern bank of Lake Hamrin on the road to Khanaqin.

Local provincial officials said that people are returning in big numbers and that they will try to facilitate further returns. Sunday’s return is the 14th such convey of IDPs recently. “Today another round returned to Sadiyah. There are only a few left to return, who will be returning in the coming days,” Musana Altamimi, the governor of Diyala, said in a news conference. 

Officials also stressed that they will be providing services and will continue to provide humanitarian assistance, especially in destroyed neighborhoods and areas. “In the next six months, we will be executing big service projects in this area in order to make more facilitations to the people of this area,” Altamimi added.

According to the International Organization for Migration, 2,071,980 Iraqis displaced since 2014 have returned through July. At least 204,684 IDPs from Diyala in that time span have since returned — most, 160,434, were locally displaced within the governorate; however, 42,396 were sheltered in Kirkuk and Sulaimani. Sadiyah is a diverse town that was overrun by ISIS in the summer of 2014, a veteran Kurdish Peshmerga commander, Mahmoud Sangawi, told Rudaw in an interview at the time.