'Surviving in the city: a review of UNHCR's operation for Iraqi refugees
in urban areas of Jordan, Lebanon and Syria'
Report available at: http://www.unhcr.org/4a69ad639.pdf
"Nothing really prepared us for this operation, so we had to adopt an
unconventional approach to the way we did business.” Those are the words
of a UNHCR staff member in the Syrian capital of Damascus, referring to
the challenge of responding to the massive Iraqi refugee exodus that has
taken place since 2006.
As explained in 'Surviving in the City', a new report from UNHCR's
Policy Development and Evaluation Service (PDES), the organization is
familiar with the demands of coping with large and sudden movements of
refugees. But in many cases, those people are housed in camps. The
unique feature of the Iraqi situation is that the vast majority of
exiled Iraqis have settled in the cities of neighbouring and nearby
states, especially Amman in Jordan, Beirut in Lebanon, as well as
Damascus and Aleppo in Syria.
The report points out that UNHCR's task in these countries was
complicated by a number of other factors, including its limited presence
in the Middle East, the absence of refugee laws in the three countries
of asylum, as well as their preoccupation with the Palestinian refugee
question.
Despite these difficult circumstances, the organization's Iraqi refugee
operation has many achievements to its credit. Taking advantage of
international interest in the crisis, UNHCR mobilized substantial
resources, rapidly scaled up its activities, deployed high-quality teams
to the field and addressed the specifically urban characteristics of the
exodus in an innovative manner.
Cash has been distributed to refugees by providing them with ATM cards.
UNHCR has kept the Iraqis informed by means of SMS messages. Refugee
women have been recruited to act as community outreach volunteers,
encouraging other Iraqis to register with UNHCR and to benefit from the
services it provides. Opinion polls have been used to understand the
needs and intentions of the refugees. And community centres have been
establish to provide Iraqis and other city-dwellers with an opportunity
to meet each other, learn new skills and enjoy recreational activities.
As a result of these initiatives, as well as the generous admission
policies adopted by Jordan, Lebanon and Syria and a substantial refugee
resettlement programme, primarily to the USA, the protection offered to
the uprooted Iraqis has improved over the past three years.
But the situation remains a fragile one.
First, the gains that have been made could easily be reversed if
negative developments were to take place in the political, economic or
security environments.
Second, the majority of Iraqis do not have any immediate prospect of
finding a solution to their plight. Most of them say that current
conditions in Iraq prevent them from repatriating, while a significant
number have no intention of returning there under any circumstances.
Only a limited number of the refugees can expect to be accepted for
resettlement, and yet those who remain in the three countries of asylum
have almost no prospect of integrating there or gaining secure residency
rights, both of which have been ruled out by the authorities.
A final concern underlined in the PDES report derives from the very real
prospect that the resources available to UNHCR will decline in the
months to come. Other emergencies are now capturing the world's
attention and the money available to humanitarian agencies may diminish
as a result of the global economic crisis.
The question now looming over the operation is whether it will be
possible to protect and support the Iraqi refugees, more than 250,000 of
whom have now registered with UNHCR, in the absence of adequate funding.
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