UN report: more than 250,000 displaced by fighting from Iraq’s Ramadi

WASHINGTON DC - More than a quarter-million people have been displaced from Ramadi in Iraq in the last two months due to military operations against the Islamic State (ISIS), according to a UN report.

“As of 2 June, a total of 251,478 individuals (41,913 families) have been displaced from Ramadi District since the launch of military operations in Anbar Governorate on 8 April,” the United Nation’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said.

“Of these, an estimated 120,000 have been displaced since 15 May,” when ISIS seized Ramadi after Iraqi troops withdrew without a fight, the report added.

OCHA estimated that hundreds of families have remained in Ramadi as Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) make advances in eastern and northern sectors.

The report said that “ISF reportedly closed all routes into and out of the city between 28 and 29 May.”

OCHA said that the condition of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Iraq is grim, with many families relocated in refugee camps in the Kurdistan region’s Sulaimani province. It added that tens of others are waiting to be admitted into Kurdistan.

Approximately two million IDPs and refugees are resettled in the Kurdistan region. The UN said that a new IDP camp will be opened by mid-June in Sulaimani, with the capacity of accommodating 1,000 families.