UNHCR helps Iraqis to rebuild homes

Written by Paul Eedle Saturday, 10 October 2009 11:12

UNHCR is trying to help some of the 2 million Iraqis who are refugees inside their own country to rebuild their houses so they can return home.

1.6 million Iraqis still displaced in their own country

Written by Paul Eedle Tuesday, 22 September 2009 09:13

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has published a detailed picture of the desperate state of 1.6 million Iraqis driven from their homes during the sectarian civil war of 2006-2007 and still unable to go home.

The IOM says: "Despite improved security in most places in Iraq, without work, their own home, schooling for children, access to water, electricity and health care, life for the vast majority of Iraq's internally displaced and for those returning home continues to be a bitter struggle."

Aftermath - Iraqi refugee stories on stage in New York

Written by Paul Eedle Friday, 18 September 2009 09:25

From the New York Times:

Assembled by its creators, Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen, from interviews with Iraqi refugees living in Jordan, “Aftermath” might be said to be set in limbo. Its performers, first seen sitting rigid on benches with their backs to us, seem to exist in an eternal waiting room.

When they turn around to tell their stories, with a courtly politeness that eventually shades into a sorrowing, baffled rage, there’s no doubt that it is we, the Americans in the dark, to whom they’re speaking. It was our country invading theirs, in 2003, that brought them to the point that, as one puts it, “I am floating between here and nowhere.”

Obama appoints senior officials for Iraqi refugees

Written by Paul Eedle Monday, 17 August 2009 23:33

World's Most Unwanted

Written by Paul Eedle Thursday, 23 July 2009 17:33

The UNHCR says Slovakia has agreed to set up an 'evacuation transit centre' which means 98 of the Palestinian refugees stranded on Iraq's border with Syria can be moved to more decent surroundings.

But this helps just 98 of the 2,713 people who have been stranded in three squalid camps in the desert for six years, and it's just a temporary solution 'while their final resettlement to other countries is arranged'. Can we really not find proper homes for this handful of the World's Most Unwanted?

Creativity VS Destruction: Stories of Iraqi Art

Written by Paul Eedle Monday, 06 July 2009 10:16

Reel Festivals is putting on an exhibition of Iraqi art at the Roxy Art House in Edinburgh:

The occupation of Iraq has seen the displacement of two million externally and two and a half internally.  Iraqi culture is also in a state of displacement.  The trauma of this experience is evident in the work of Iraqi artists both within and without the country.

Creativity vs Destruction is an exhibition that explores the experiences of five internationally respected Iraqi artists from the 1970s up to the present day.  The focal point of the exhibition will be work from Rashad Selim, Waafa Bilal, Sama Alshaibi, Maysaloun Faraj and Henaa Mal-Allah.

On July the 12^th at 6:00 Rashad Selim noted Iraqi artist and activist will close the exhibition with a lecture entitled Creativity vs Destruction: Stories of Iraqi Art.

The exhibition runs from 02/07/09 to 12/07/09 and will be open every day from 12 to 4 at the Roxy Art House, EH8 9SU.

www.roxyarthouse.org