Iraq refugees find no relief from sectarian strife

Baghdad, July 21: Um Abdullah fled one of Baghdad's bloodiest neighbourhoods fearing her Sunni Arab family would become victims of rising sectarian violence.

But she quickly realised that a camp for some of the country's swelling refugee community only offered more danger.

''Last night gunmen attacked our camp. I saw bullets hitting the ground near my children,'' she said in a tent in the grounds of a mosque in western Baghdad under sweltering heat.

''We told the Iraqi Red Crescent that we would rather take aid and leave the camp because most of the families left this morning.

We didn't run from death to face it again here in this miserable place.'' Raging sectarian bloodshed has forced a sharp increase in the number of Iraqis fleeing their homes this month, the Migration Ministry said yesterday, calling it a dangerous rise of about 32,000 refugees in three weeks to about 162,000.

The figure could be much higher because the statistics only cover registered refugees from communal violence pushing Iraq towards all-out civil war. Many do not register or go abroad.

Thirty-four families, including Um Abdullah's, moved to a camp at the Sunni Um Tobul mosque in Baghdad two weeks ago. But only five remain after gunmen opened fire on their tents on Wednesday, said Wafa Mahmoud, an Iraqi Red Crescent official.

The pattern of tit-for-tat displacements is familiar.

Gunmen leave written threats of death unless members of one sect or another flees their home. Sometimes a neighbour is shot dead, in an unmistakable warning to others.

Homes are quickly boarded up and typically large Iraqi families end up at a camp.

For some, it seems like there is no escape no matter how many times they flee.

Um Iyad, mother of four, said the Um Tobul mosque was her family's third attempt to find safety.

''We can't stand this life of escaping. I wish they would bomb us with chemical weapon so we die and rest in peace,'' she said.

The United Nations warned this week that the forced migrations were fuelling a vicious cycle of hatred. That holds grave implications for future generations: Asked about Shi'ite militiamen who his mother blames for forcing them from their home, Um Abdullah's four-year-old son Abdullah said: ''I want a pistol to kill them.''

Reuters