Over 100 families flee IS-held regions in Western Mosul, U.N says 300.000 displaced
Displaced Iraqis who just fled their homes are transported to refugee camps as Iraqi forces battle with Islamic State militants, in western Mosul, Iraq February 28, 2017. REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra – RTS10RPL
“90 families arrived at the freed areas controlled by ICTF after being able to flee areas of al-Hawi, al-Refaei and al-Najjar, which are controlled by IS,” Colonel Waad al-Sharif told BasNews.
Security services, according to Sharif, “distributed the families among mosques and schools at the freed regions after checking their identity cards.”
Meanwhile, a security source said that another fifty families fled toward the south of Mosul.
“Fifty families arrived at al-Okaidat region in south of the city, fleeing al-Midan area in central Mosul, which is still controlled by IS fighters,” the source told the National News Center.
“Security troops received the families after escaping IS after several people were abducted and executed,” the source said adding that troops checked their identities before opening mosques for them to live at until central Mosul is freed.
More than 300,000 people have fled Mosul since the start of the U.S.-backed campaign to dislodge Islamic State from the northern Iraqi city in October, the United Nations said on Tuesday.
The United Nations’ International Organisation for Migration estimates the number of people currently displaced to be 302,400, the office of the U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq said in a statement. The Iraqi government has, however, put the total at more than 400.000.
Iraqi forces, backed by a U.S.-led coalition, have taken most districts of Mosul, Islamic State’s last major stronghold in Iraq and the city where the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, declared a caliphate nearly three years ago.
They are now battling to take the northwestern part from Islamic State but the civilian death toll has mounted in the densely populated Old City, where the militants are dug in amongst residents.
More people are expected to flee the fighting and camps for the displaced north and east of Mosul are expanding, the U.N. statement said.