ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The Iraqi government will continue providing aid to camps in the Kurdistan Region after the July 30 deadline and an Erbil-Baghdad joint committee was formed to discuss their closure.
 
In January, Baghdad set July 30 as the deadline for the Kurdistan Region to close camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs) and to stop providing aid.
 
Ali Abbas, spokesperson for the Ministry of Displacement and Migration, told Rudaw’s Nahro Mohammed on Thursday that the closure of the camps will be delayed for “several reasons” without elaborating.
 
A joint committee will be formed between the Iraqi federal government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), holding its first meeting in August to assess the situation and facilitate the safe return of all IDPs, Abbas added.
 
The migration ministry also announced on Thursday that 805 IDPs from Duhok’s Sharia camp voluntarily have returned to their places of origin in Shingal (Sinjar) recently.
 
Around 26,500 families remain in the Kurdistan Region’s IDP camps, including 22,000 in camps in Duhok,  the spokesperson said. All IDP camps in Sulaimani have been completely shut down.
 
Baghdad has offered four million dinars (about $3,050) to families who return to their homes by July 30.
 
Despite the financial incentive, many families are reluctant to leave because of continued violence in their places of origin, a lack of reconstruction following the destruction of their homes, and little in the way of basic services. Some who voluntarily left the camps have been forced to return, unable to piece together the basics.
 
Human rights advocates have expressed concern about Iraq’s push to close the camps, saying that all returns must be voluntary, safe, and dignified.
 
There are more than 630,000 IDPs in the Kurdistan Region, though most of them reside outside of the 23 camps established across Duhok, Erbil, and Sulaimani provinces, according to March figures from the KRG’s Joint Crisis Coordination Center.