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Iraq PM Chairs Cabinet Meeting in Nasiriyah

Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi. (Reuters)
Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi. (Reuters)
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Iraq PM Chairs Cabinet Meeting in Nasiriyah

Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi. (Reuters)
Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi. (Reuters)

Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi paid a visit on Monday to the southern province of Dhi Qar where he chaired a regular cabinet meeting.

The province, which lies some 390 kilometers south of Baghdad, suffers from poor services and high poverty and unemployment. It has been a flashpoint for the year-long anti-government protests.

The premier’s press office said Kadhimi toured the region to inspect the state of security and services there and address obstacles facing their improvement.

Observers said the PM sought through the visit to ease the simmering popular anger there by making pledges about improving services, providing job opportunities and kicking off long stalled projects.

He held talks with various tribal, societal and official figures, underlining the extent of the federal authority’s concern over the developments and state of neglect in Dhi Qar.

During the cabinet meeting, Kadhimi declared that the situation in the province demands “serious government efforts”.

“We are determined to take decisions that favor the province and its people,” he stressed.

Special attention must be dedicated to Nasiriyah city where projects can be launched and job opportunities provided, he added.

Ministers must exert more efforts to ensure that decisions taken over Dhi Qar are implemented, he urged.

A government spokesman said the cabinet approved a number of decisions related to Nasiriyah airport, establishing main highways and a reconstruction fund and speeding up the completion of the industrial city.

Kadhimi also paid a visit to the Martyrs’ Bridge on the Euphrates River that connects the western and southern parts of Nasiriyah. The bridge was the scene of violent clashes between anti-government protesters and security forces.

He met with a number of families of slain protesters, offering his condolences and pledging to meet their demands.

A statement from the PM’s office said Kadhimi stressed to the families that his government will forge ahead in its mission to “safeguard the rights of the martyrs, bring the murderers to justice, press ahead with reform and crack down on corruption.”

Despite these pledges, Kadhimi’s government has yet to arrest any of these murderers and it has yet to announce the results of investigations into violence against the protesters, raising doubts among the demonstrators about the seriousness of its measures.

The security forces have yet to also release kidnapped activist Sajjad al-Iraqi, who was abducted three weeks ago on the outskirts of Nasiriyah.

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Arab World

Iraqis Face Tough Homecoming a Decade after ISIS Rampage

A woman and a boy in the camp near Hassan Shami for the internally displaced. Safin HAMID / AFP
A woman and a boy in the camp near Hassan Shami for the internally displaced. Safin HAMID / AFP
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Iraqis Face Tough Homecoming a Decade after ISIS Rampage

A woman and a boy in the camp near Hassan Shami for the internally displaced. Safin HAMID / AFP
A woman and a boy in the camp near Hassan Shami for the internally displaced. Safin HAMID / AFP

A decade after the ISIS group extremists rampaged through northern Iraq, Moaz Fadhil and his eight children finally returned to their village after languishing for years in a displacement camp.
Their home, Hassan Shami, is just a stone's throw from the tent city where they had been living, and it still bears the scars of the fight against ISIS.
The militants seized a third of Iraq, ruling their self-declared "caliphate" with an iron fist, before an international coalition wrestled control from them in 2017.
Seven years on, many of the village's homes are still in ruins and lacking essential services, but Fadhil said he felt an "indescribable joy" upon moving back in August.
Iraq -- marred by decades of war and turmoil even before the rise of ISIS -- is home to more than a million internally displaced people.
Baghdad has been pushing for the closure of the displacement camps, with the country having attained a degree of comparative stability in recent years.
Most of the camps in federal Iraq have now been closed, but around 20 remain in the northern autonomous Kurdistan region, which according to the United Nations house more than 115,000 displaced people.
But for many, actually returning home can be a difficult task.
After getting the green light from Kurdish security forces to leave the camp, Fadhil moved his family into a friend's damaged house because his own is a complete ruin.
'Beautiful memories'
"Water arrives by tanker trucks and there is no electricity," said the 53-year-old.
Although the rubble has been cleared from the structure he now lives in, the cinder block walls and rough concrete floors remain bare.
Across Hassan Shami, half-collapsed houses sit next to concrete buildings under construction by those residents who can afford to rebuild.
Some have installed solar panels to power their new lives.
A small new mosque stands, starkly white, beside an asphalt road.
"I was born here, and before me my father and mother," said Fadhil, an unemployed farmer.
"I have beautiful memories with my children, my parents."
The family survives mainly on the modest income brought in by his eldest son, who works as a day laborer on building sites.
"Every four or five days he works a day" for about $8, said Fadhil.
In an effort to close the camps and facilitate returns, Iraqi authorities are offering families around $3,000 to go back to their places of origin.
To do so, displaced people must also get security clearance -- to ensure they are not wanted for extremist crimes -- and have their identity papers or property rights in order.
But of the 11,000 displaced people still living in six displacement camps near Hassan Shami, 600 are former prisoners, according to the UN.
They were released after serving up to five years for crimes related to membership of ISIS.
Not that simple
For them, going home can mean further complications.
There's the risk of ostracism by neighbors or tribes for their perceived affiliation with IS atrocities, potential arrest at a checkpoint by federal forces or even a second trial.
Among them is 32-year-old Rashid, who asked that we use a pseudonym because of his previous imprisonment in Kurdistan for belonging to the extremist ISIS group.
He said he hopes the camp next to Hassan Shami does not close.
"I have a certificate of release (from prison), everything is in order... But I can't go back there", he said of federal Iraq.
"If I go back it's 20 years" in jail, he added, worried that he would be tried again in an Iraqi court.
Ali Abbas, spokesperson for Iraq's migration ministry, said that those who committed crimes may indeed face trial after they leave the camps.
"No one can prevent justice from doing its job", he said, claiming that their families would not face repercussions.
The government is working to ensure that families who return have access to basic services, Abbas added.
In recent months, Baghdad has repeatedly tried to set deadlines for Kurdistan to close the camps, even suing leaders of the autonomous region before finally opting for cooperation over coercion.
Imrul Islam of the Norwegian Refugee Council said displacement camps by definition are supposed to be temporary, but warned against their hasty closure.
When people return, "you need schools. You need hospitals. You need roads. And you need working markets that provide opportunities for livelihoods," he said.
Without these, he said, many families who try to resettle in their home towns would end up returning to the camps.