UN refugee commissioner makes plea for displaced Iraqis

Feb 8, 2007, 18:11 GMT

Damascus - Antonio Guterres, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, called on the international community Thursday to 'recognize the dimension' of the Iraqi refugee problem and provide support for host countries, especially Syria and Jordan.

Guterres, speaking in Damascus, said he had 'open and frank' discussions with Syrian officials who assured him that new visa regulations made by Syria were not aimed at dispelling Iraqis.

'They will not be pushed or forced to go to Iraq. I think that is a very important statement,' Guterres said. Some 200 Iraqi refugees protested the new Syrian regulations during Guterres' visit.

Guterres was talking to reporters during a tour at one of the Syrian Red Crescent's offices in Damascus's southern Sayyedeh Zaynab suburb where many Iraqi refugees are living.

The UN agency was dealing with symptoms of the political disease in Iraq that had led to some three million refugees, two million of them outside the country, he said.

'We can only try to support people - and to support people in such huge numbers needs a massive commitment of the international community,' he said.

'It is important to recognize that the international community has not been able until now to recognize the dimension of the problem.

'They need support from everywhere, and we need to mobilize that support for countries like Syria which are paying a heavy price, to be able to have the solidarity necessary to carry this burden and to provide assistance to these people.'

Guterres said his message to Syria was a message of 'solidarity and admiration of the extreme generosity,' for receiving about one million Iraqi refugees who were facing humanitarian disaster and displacement.

He said the conference his agency was planning in Geneva in April was to 'mobilize much bigger support, especially for the countries that are paying the price of being generous in hosting refugees.'

Earlier, Guterres expressed during a meeting with the Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Fayssal Mekdad his agency's readiness to 'provide needed support within its authority and ability' to help the Syrian government deal with the issue of Iraqi refugees.

Syria's official news agency SANA quoted Mekdad as saying the international community 'has to bear its humanitarian and political responsibility in this regard.'

Syrian Interior Minister Bassam Abdul-Majid assured Guterres that the new Syrian visa measures aimed at 'organizing their stay and recording their numbers accurately,' SANA said.

'Any Iraqi citizen can inter Syria without a visa as any Arab citizen - but he has to apply for regular stay within 15 days after entering Syria,' Abdulmajid was quoted by SANA as saying.

More than 500 Iraqi refugees had gathered last Sunday in front of the UNHCR office in Damascus to register and guarantee they would not be deported by Syrian authorities.

This followed accusations Friday by Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh that 'thousands of Iraqis are being put in a difficult situation' in Syria.

He said Iraqis going to Syria to avoid the violence in their homeland were being given only 15-day entrance visas and some had to leave the country for at least 30 days before being allowed in again.

The UNHCR reported that the number of Iraqis registered with the organization was at more than 46,000 and increasing daily.

Official Syrian sources on Sunday said the measures introduced by the Syrian government were taken for security and economic purposes, while the Iraqis' residency in Syria was still under discussion.

Stressing that Syria was 'exerting all-out efforts to help the Iraqi people in their ordeal,' the officials explained that Syria was overburdened by the exodus of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis.