Kurdistan Regional Government Representation in the United States Washington D.C.

Welcome to our February 2020 Humanitarian Bulletin

© UNHCR/Hussein Fatemi: A newly arrived four-year old Syrian Kurdish refugee in Bardarash camp in Duhok. The camp hosts more than 17,000 new Syrian Kurdish refugees.

The Kurdistan Region serves as a sanctuary to over 1 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) and refugees. This means there has been close to 20 percent increase to Kurdistan's existing population of 5.5 million. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) shoulders about 70% of the almost 1 billion USD annual cost to provide basic services to the refugees and IDP’s. The displaced people live across three provinces of the KRI—Duhok, Erbil, and Slemani—in both camps and urban and rural settings.  Since the beginning of the Turkish military incursion into northeast Syria (Rojava) on 9 October 2019, more than 20,545 Syrian Kurds have crossed into the Kurdistan Region. At its height, the rate of refugees entering Kurdistan surprised 1,735, but it has dropped to about 35-45 in recent weeks.  The ongoing turmoil continues to affect the physical and mental well-being, living standards and recovery of millions of IDPs and refugees. The recent escalation of violence by the remnants of ISIS in the disputed areas and the Sunni triangle has also led to an increase in the return of IDPs to Kurdistan. Further, most of the IDPs in camps do not intend to return to their place of origin because of security and economic reasons.

HIGHLIGHTS More than 1,050,500 refugees and IDPs are registered in the Kurdistan Region.  More than of 28, 617 refugees and IDPs arrived to the Kurdistan in 2019: 19,825 refugees 8,794 IDPs. More than 15,154 refugees and IDPs returned to their place of origin or migrated to another country.   More than half of the displaced people are women and children.

About 40% of the refugees live in 10 camps and 20% of the IDPs live in 28 camps across three provinces in the Kurdistan Region: 47.5% are in Erbil, 33% in Duhok, and 19.5% in Slemani.

According to KRG's Joint Crisis Coordination Center (JCC), 787,367 internally displaced persons (IDPs) are registered in Kurdistan.

The total incoming humanitarian funding in Iraq for 2019 was about 647.5 million USD. The United States was the largest donor country—followed by Germany, Canada, the European Commission, Japan, United Kingdom, Australia, France, Sweden, Norway, Belgium, Switzerland, Denmark, Italy, Kuwait, South Korea, Ireland, Qatar, Luxembourg, Czech Republic, Poland, and Malaysia. Text Link

The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) is grateful and expresses its sincere gratitude to all of the countries, UN Agencies, and international and local NGOs for their financial support and their dedication to alleviating the suffering of the vulnerable displaced people in Kurdistan and the rest of Iraq. Funding Gaps: The KRG is experiencing a huge funding gap for supporting the displaced people. On average, it costs about $2.7 million US dollars per day ($81 million per month) to provide basic civic services to the displaced people in Kurdistan. Approximately 25 percent of the funding is covered and managed by the United Nations Agencies and US Department of State bureaus and 5 percent by International and local NGOs. The KRG provides about 70 percent of funds out of its budget to sustain current basic services, which has exhausted its resources. Lack of funding has forced humanitarian partners to either reduce or completely terminate services and ongoing projects. This threatens the welfare and lives of the IDPs and refugees. To learn more about the humanitarian situation or how you can support the vulnerable displaced people in Kurdistan, please contact the Director of Humanitarian Affairs: Delovan Barwari Director of Humanitarian Affairs Office:    +1 (202) 821-1861 Email:    [email protected] Twitter: @DelovanBarwari