Iraqi politicians urge world to help its refugees
Source: Reuters
BAGHDAD, Feb 11 (Reuters) - The international community must urgently assist millions of Iraqis displaced inside the country or forced abroad during four years of war and now worsening sectarian violence, Iraqi parliamentarians said on Sunday. Abdul-Khaliq Zengena, a lawmaker from the Kurdish bloc who heads a parliamentary committee on the issue, said the United States and Britain should do more. "This problem has become huge," Zengena told a news conference with other parliamentarians. "The United States and the United Kingdom have to take primary responsibility for caring for these families," he said, describing the impact from the refugee disaster as "like an earthquake or a flood that has submerged the whole country". The U.S. State Department said last week it had created a task force to make sure the United States is doing "its share" to take in Iraqi refugees following criticism in Congress that it accepted only 202 last year. Britain was the key U.S. ally in the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq that toppled Saddam Hussein. Since militants bombed a Shi'ite shrine in Samarra a year ago, triggering a surge in sectarian chaos, the exodus of Iraqis to neighbouring states or being forced to find shelter elsewhere within Iraq had grown to "frightening" levels, Zengena said. Out of Iraq's population of 26 million, some 1.8 million Iraqis are uprooted within its borders, including an estimated 640,000 in the past year alone, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). A total of 2 million Iraqis have fled to nearby countries or beyond over the years. Besides Jordan and Syria, the other regional hosts are Egypt, Lebanon, Turkey and Iran. Parliament speaker Mahmoud al-Mashhadani told the news conference that a delegation would be formed to invite Arab and European countries to an international conference on the issue. He did not say where the meeting would take place.
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