ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Officials from the governments in Erbil and Baghdad met on Sunday and discussed the importance of creating “peace and stability” in Iraq to enable the safe return of internally displaced persons (IDP) back to their places of origin, according to a statement. President of the Kurdistan Region, Nechirvan Barzani, met with Iraqi Minister of Migration and the Displacement, Evan Jabro, on Sunday in Erbil to discuss the conditions faced by IDPs and refugees in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region, as well as the ways to pave the way for displaced families to return to their hometowns. “At the meeting, the latest on the conditions of the refugees and the internally displaced people in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region were discussed,” a statement from the Kurdistan Region presidency released Sunday reads. According to the statement, the officials also discussed the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on refugee and IDP camps. “Both sides also stressed the importance of assuring peace and stability in the country in order for the displaced people to return to their homes, particularly Yazidis and Christians and ways to compensate them,” the statement added. The Iraqi minister also met with the Prime Minister of Kurdistan Region Government (KRG), Masrour Barzani, in Erbil on the same day to discuss the same matter, according to a separate statement from the KRG. “In the meeting, both sides reviewed current conditions of refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) in host communities and camps across the Kurdistan Region and Iraq, and emphasized the need to facilitate voluntary returns to their ancestral homes,” the statement reads. This comes after the Iraqi security forces launched a new military operation in Diyala province on Sunday aimed at “creat[ing] a safe environment for the return of displaced families” in various areas, according to Yehia Rasool, spokesperson for the commander-in-chief. Diyala, which lies in the disputed territories, has become a hotspot for ISIS attacks. Members of the minority Kakai community have been particularly targeted. The Islamic State (ISIS) took control of large swathes of Iraqi territory in 2014, forcing millions of people to flee to other areas in Iraq, with many displaced to the Kurdistan Region. The Iraqi government announced the territorial defeat of ISIS in December 2017. The liberation of the areas also led to more displacements, as civilians fled in an attempt to avoid being trapped in the battle between security forces and ISIS. Iraq recaptured Mosul and its surrounding areas in the Nineveh province from ISIS in June 2017 after a lengthy campaign involving Iraqi security forces, Peshmerga and the US-led anti-ISIS international coalition. There are still more than 780,000 internally displaced Iraqis in the Kurdistan region, mostly from Nineveh, Saladin and Anbar provinces, according to the KRG’s Joint Crisis Coordination Centre (JCC). Although territorially defeated, remnants of ISIS have since returned to their earlier insurgency tactics, ambushing security forces, kidnapping and executing suspected informants, and extorting money from vulnerable rural populations. This has resulted in IDPs fearing returning to their hometowns. Having lost all of its urban strongholds, the group is now most active in Iraq’s remote deserts and mountains, and in territories disputed by the governments of the Kurdistan Region and Iraq, where a wide security vacuum has opened up.
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