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IRAQ / GUTERRES
STORY: IRAQ / GUTERRES
TRT: 2.22
SOURCE: UNHCR
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH /ARABIC / NATS
DATELINE: 17, 18, 19 & 24, JANUARY 2011, AL SECHA SETTLEMENT, CHIKOOK SETTLEMENT, UM AL BANEEN CAMP, IRAQ
18 JANUARY 2011, AL SECHA CAMP, IRAQ
1. Pan right, camp
2. Med shot, Huda’s son at the door of his home
3. Various shots, Huda Raheem Adwan feeding her children
4. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Huda Raheem Adwan, IDP (Internally Displaced Person), Al-Secha:
“My husband was a business man selling gas. He left the house in the morning and we found him dead in the hospital in evening. I was told that he died in a car accident but the car that hit him ran away afterwards.”
5. Wide shot, kids going to school walking on a destroyed path
19 JANUARY 2011, CHIKOOK SETTLEMENT, IRAQ
6. Various shots, Chikook camp
24 JANUARY 2011, UM AL BANEEN CAMP, IRAQ
7. Wide shot, High Commissioner stepping out of a car and walking
8. Tilt up, from elderly woman to High Commissioner meeting a family in their house
9. SOUND-UP (English) Antonio Gutteres, High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR):
“Is she taking medicine?”
10. Med shot, High Commissioner with media
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Antonio Gutteres, High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR):
“We had (yesterday) a very good meeting with the President, Prime Minister and the Foreign Minister. We believe we will be able to work more effectively in the future, not only to try to give an answer to this dramatic humanitarian situation of the people that live in this worse conditions like the ones in the camp.”
12. Wide shot, High Commissioner walks out of the camp
19 JANUARY 2011, CHIKOOK SETTLEMENT, IRAQ
13. Various shots, Chikook Camp
14. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Abd Jais, Chikook, IDP (Internally Displaced Person):
“All health issues are poor including running water as well as sanitation. When someone gets sick it is verse difficult to reach the clinic too can see the road conditions.”
15. Various shots, Chikook Camp
16. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Un Mohamed, Chikook IDP (Internally Displaced Person):
“When it rains we drown and those kids become orphans. They have no one and I do not have electricity because the power was turned off by the owner of the generator because I do not have the means to pay him.”
17. Various shots, UNHCR distribution of Non Food Items at Chikook Camp
The living conditions are dire, makeshift and unsafe housing, waste and garbage all around no services.
This is Al-Secha one of the hundreds of IDP (Internally Displaced Persons) settlements in Iraq.
Almost 200 families live here on railway lands as illegal tenants, most victims of Baghdad’s sectarian violence or of its economic hardship.
Huda Raheem Adwan is 22 years old and a widow.
SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Huda Raheem Adwan, IDP (Internally Displaced Person):
“My husband was a business man selling gas. He left the house in the morning and we found him dead in the hospital in evening. I was told that he died in a car accident but the car that hit him ran away afterwards.”
Widows, like Adwan, have little or no income often they have to keep their children from school to help support the family.
In recent years, thousands of displaced have managed to return or find new homes. But UNHCR estimates that there still 1.3 million people displaced in Iraq with over half a million of them living in slums like these.
In this abandoned military building, Um Al-Baneed camp there are 112 families.
Recently, they all faced eviction but the government had to relent. They had nowhere to go
Antonio Gutteres, UN High Commissioner for Refugees on a visit to Um Al-Baneed met with several families.
SOUNDBITE (English) Antonio Gutteres, High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR):
“Is she taking medicine?”
Top of his agenda: ways to improve the situation.
SOUNDBITE (English) Antonio Gutteres, High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR):
“We had (yesterday) a very good meeting with the President, Prime Minister and the Foreign Minister. We believe we will be able to work more effectively in the future, not only to try to give an answer to this dramatic humanitarian situation of the people that live in this worse conditions like the ones in the camp.”
Chikook is one of the largest settlements in the country. It hosts over 3000 families.
For these displaced, returning to their former neighborhoods is unlikely.
SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Abd Jais, Chikook, IDP (Internally Displaced Person):
“All health issues are poor including running water as well as sanitation. When someone gets sick it is verse difficult to reach the clinic too can see the road conditions.”
Um Mohamed looks after six boys, some hers, others orphans.
SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Un Mohamed, Chikook IDP (Internally Displaced Person):
“When it rains we drown and those kids become orphans. They have no one and I do not have electricity because the power was turned off by the owner of the generator because I do not have the means to pay him.”
UNHCR distributes plastic sheeting and other basic household goods and recently it completed a 20,000 home reconstruction project, but much more assistance is needed.
The IDPs say that getting a small piece of land or an apartment to call their own would be a good start. Only then, they say, will they be able to put down roots and have a chance to rebuild their lives.
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