Media Home
UN Web TV
UN Audiovisual Library
UN PhotoGENEVA / MOSUL
Download
There is no media available to download.
Share
STORY: GENEVA / MOSUL
TRT: 02:52
SOURCE: UNTV CH
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 24 JANUARY 2017, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
RECENT, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
1. Wide shot, exterior Palais des Nations
24 JANUARY 2017, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
2. Wide shot, press briefing room
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Ravina Shamdasani, Spokesperson for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR):
“The reports we have received and have been able to verify from ISIL - occupied areas are patchy, but we have had several reports of people being shot at as they attempt to flee ISIL - controlled areas of the city.”
4. Wide shot, journalists
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Ravina Shamdasani, Spokesperson for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR):
“Airstrikes in Mosul also reportedly continued to cause civilian casualties, although it is difficult to verify how many civilians have been killed or injured, particularly since information indicates that ISIL continues to base itself in civilian houses and infrastructure and is exploiting civilians as shields. We are deeply concerned about the safety and humanitarian conditions of people who remain in ISIL-occupied western Mosul city, which it is estimated could be as many as 750,000.”
6. Med shot, journalists
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Joel Millmann, Spokesperson for the International Organisation for Migration (IOM):
“A hundred days after military operations to retake Mosul started, humanitarian partners including IOM and others, are expressing deep concern about the plight of the estimated 750,000 civilians who are currently living in the western sections of the city where fighting is expected to start in coming weeks.”
8. Medium shot, journalists
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Joel Millmann, Spokesperson for the International Organisation for Migration (IOM):
“To date 180,000 people have fled the eastern section of the city, more than 550,000 civilians have stayed in their homes. Humanitarian partners are working as quickly as possible to provide direct lifesaving assistance, nearly 600,000 people have received food, 745,000 people have benefited from water and sanitation support and 370,000 people have sought medical care. 85 per cent of the people displaced from Mosul are staying in displacement camps and emergency sites constructed by the government and international partners.”
10. Close up, journalist
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Christophe Boulierac, Spokesperson for the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF):
“Thirty schools reopened on Sunday in east Mosul with the help from UNICEF allowing over 16,000 children to resume their education. So it is an initiative taken by the department of education, by the Iraqi department of education. We UNICEF we have supplied math kits, science kits, teacher material, recreative material. Some school in the area were close up for up to two years and girls were banned from getting an education.”
12. Wide shot, press briefing room
13. SOUNDBITE (English) Christophe Boulierac, Spokesperson for the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF):
“An additional 40 schools are expected to open in the coming weeks, after being checked for unexploded ordonnance by local authorities to accommodate a total of 40,000 students”.
14. Wide shot, podium
Three quarters of a million civilians living in the western part of Iraq’s city Mosul are at risk, the United Nations warned today (24 Jan) , as Iraqi security forces prepare for a push to retake the city from fighters of the so-called Islamic State (ISIL). The warning came 100 days after the start of the military operation to recapture Mosul.
Speaking to reporters in Geneva on this morning (Tuesday), the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani said that “the reports we have received and have been able to verify from ISIL-occupied areas are patchy, but we have had several reports of people being shot at as they attempt to flee ISIL-controlled areas of the city.”
Ramdasani said “airstrikes in Mosul also reportedly continued to cause civilian casualties, although it is difficult to verify how many civilians have been killed or injured, particularly since information indicates that ISIL continues to base itself in civilian houses and infrastructure and is exploiting civilians as shields.”
She said “we are deeply concerned about the safety and humanitarian conditions of people who remain in ISIL-occupied western Mosul city, which it is estimated could be as many as 750,000.”
Joel Millman, spokesperson for the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), said that “to date 180,000 people have fled the eastern section of the city; more than 550,000 civilians have stayed in their homes. Humanitarian partners are working as quickly as possible to provide direct lifesaving assistance, nearly 600,000 people have received food, 745,000 people have benefited from water and sanitation support and 370,000 people have sought medical care. Eighty-five per cent of the people displaced from Mosul are staying in displacement camps and emergency sites constructed by the government and international partners.”
IOM also reported that they heard from people coming out of combat zones, that conditions inside Mosul are deteriorating and prices for food are skyrocketing.
Amidst this worrying news, Christophe Boulierac, spokesperson for the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), reported that “30 schools reopened on Sunday in east Mosul with the help from UNICEF allowing over 16,000 children to resume their education. So it is an initiative taken by the department of education, by the Iraqi department of education”.
He added that “UNICEF has supplied math kits, science kits, teacher material, recreative material. Some schools in the area were closed up for up to two years and girls were banned from getting an education.”
Boulierac said that “an additional 40 schools are expected to open in the coming weeks, after being checked for unexploded ordnance by local authorities to accommodate a total of 40,000 students.”
Iraqi security forces are reported to have accepted the principle of putting civilian protection as a central element of their battle plan. Humanitarian partners working with the UN have welcomed this approach and have renewed their collective call on all the parties to the conflict to uphold their obligations to protect civilians, as spelled out under international humanitarian law.
