The Iraq war: Social and humanitarian implications

This report has been prepared by Dar Al Tanmiya, as commissioned by ESCWA. As provided for in the Terms of Conditions of Use of United Nations Web Sites, the opinions expressed in this report are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the United Nations or its Member States. This report is reproduced as submitted by the author.

Beirut 10 June 2003

THE IRAQ WAR: SOCIAL AND HUMANITARIAN IMPLICATIONS
CONSOLIDATED REPORT
(10 April - 6 June 2003)

CONTENTS

Executive Summary

A - Preamble

B - Security Situation and Political Context

C - Human Cost

D - Population Movements (displaced/refugees)

E - Human Rights Issues

F - Food Situation and Relief Coordination

G - Health Situation

H - Education Situation

I - Services and Public Utilities

* * *

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

After more than a month of slow progress toward alleviating the humanitarian situation in Iraq after the war, the occupying forces finally coalesced into a Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), headed by a US career diplomat, to oversee matters. However, the slow response to the lack of security throughout the country, and especially in the capital, along with the go-slow policy of turning power over to Iraqis, have alienated many people. The CPA is focusing on boosting security, relieving some basic needs and turning some public responsibilities over to Iraqis, on a carefully monitored basis.

The lifting of UN sanctions, stipulated by UNSC Resolution 1483 voted on 22 May, while expected to help in some reconstruction areas, has raised concerns on the fate of the crucial Public Distribution System when the UN's Oil-for-Food program will be phased out in six months. It will also be balanced against the CPA's rigorous policy of de-Baathification, which has seen several hundred thousand employees of the former regime's state apparatus thrown out of work.

After weeks of uncertainty, the CPA is now paying civil servants and pensioners and re-adjusting pay scales to favor certain professions and penalize others.

In the absence of official statistics, non-governmental groups continue to revise upwards their estimates of civilian casualties during the conflict (reaching now some 7,000 killed and 30,000 injured among civilians only), which are also increasing due to post-war incidents of revenge killings, accidents involving unexploded ordinance, and a general lack of law and order. The exact number of Iraqi prisoners of war is also in doubt, due to accusations that the occupying powers have not allowed access to all detainees.

While massive waves of refugees did not result from the conflict, hundreds of thousands of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) must be dealth with, say international officials and aid workers. Several hundred thousand Iraqis outside the country may eventually return, and incidents of violence have already taken place when IDPs seek to return to their original homes, such as in the mixed Kurdish-Arab northern part of the country.

There are also human rights issues related to threats by Iraqis against non-Iraqi refugees residing in the country. Other human rights issues included mass graves of victims from the former regime; these are in fact crime scenes that have been unprotected by the occupying forces. The US and UK have also been accused of human rights violations during the occupation.

The food situation has received a boost with the re-launch in June of the Public Distribution System, the mechanism that was set up to get food to Iraqis under the UN's Oil for Food Program, but uncertainy remain on the substitute of this crucial program (benefiting to 60% of Iraqi population) vowed to phase out in six months according to UNSC Res. 1483 . In general, relief agencies have demanded better security conditions in order to do their jobs. A preliminary estimate of funding for humanitarian assistance and reconstruction needs stands at about $2 billion.

Iraq's postwar health situation has been hit by the emergence of several dozen cases of cholera, mainly in the Basra area, due to the lack of clean water. Acute malnutrition is also a chief concern, although aid officials say that Iraq's fairly well-developed health sector needs "jump-starting" and not a thorough effort that would begin from zero. One official has warned of a deterioration in the summer due to the lack of fresh water, which is expected to cause many cases of severe diarrhea. As with other humanitarian areas, the health sector has been hampered by a lack of security and looting of various facilities.

The education sector has begun returning to normal, although weeks of post-war insecurity took their tool on attendance and morale, while the CPA's de-Baathification policy removed many qualified senior teachers who were unfortunate enough to be party members. Ad hoc curriculum reform has also taken place, and fears mount that mid-summer end-of-year examinations might not be handled well enough to ensure a satisfactory pass rate for students.

Public utilities and services have improved at a slow, but steady rate after the war, with security concerns hampering much of the rebuilding efforts. The CPA and international organizations have identified assistance and other needs in the areas of electricity, water supplies and trash collection;

The banking sector and the oil sector, which could help alleviate electricity problems, have been slow to recover.

A - PREAMBLE

This is a consolidated report covering the two months that followed the occupation of Iraq by the US/UK coalition forces. It falls within the framework of the consultancy project commissioned by ESCWA, "The Iraq War: Social and Humanitarian Implications". It has been preceeded by four sequential reports issued on 14 April, 2 May, 12 May and 22 May 2003.

This project involves:

• Monitoring the social and humanitarian repercussions of the war on the following levels: human security, the health situation, the nutritional situation, basic public services and utilities, displaced and refugees, the housing situation, and the education situation.
• Identifying priorities to confront the situation and drafting relevant recommendations and suggestions, with a focus on areas falling within the interest and purview of the United Nations (and particularly ESCWA).

B - SECURITY SITUATION AND POLITICAL CONTEXT

The Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), headed by American diplomat L Paul Bremer, has emerged to administer post-war affairs in Iraq after weeks of hesitation and uncertainty by the occupying powers. This occurred in parallel with the UN Security Council passing Resolution 1483 that giving the occupying powers very large prerogatives to administer Iraqi affairs. US President George W Bush had previously announced that combat missions had ended in Iraq at the beginning of May, but an uneasy peace and administrative uncertainty continue to prevail in the country.

While large-scale humanitarian disasters have failed to materialize, some officials have warned that the continuing administrative and political limbo in Iraq, despite the presence of the CPA, could trigger health catastrophes or other social explosions in the near future.

Security remains uncertain in many parts of Iraq, although it has slowly improved in the weeks following the end of hostilities around 9 April. Despite the presence of US and UK military forces, paramilitary groups have sprung up in areas of Baghdad and religious leaders have overseen ad hoc local authority in various parts of the south, while some tribes assumed responsibility for law and order in remote desert areas.

Recent attacks against US troops forced Washington in early June to deploy 1,500 troops in several towns in central Iraq, while thousands of military police were brought in to Baghdad in May to help restore order, after regular army units were deemed unsuitable for the task.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (www.icrc.org) evaluated the security situation at the beginning of June as volatile, despite efforts to establish a credible police force. An 11pm-6am curfew remained in effect in Baghdad, while areas like Basra have seen a noticeable improvement in security.

In mid-May, news reports indicated that 242 people had been killed in Baghdad alone since the end of the war, mostly the victims of shooting incidents. On 13 May, the International Committee of the Red Cross (www.icrc.org) said security remained the top issue for Iraqis, adding that looting, banditry, car-jacking, physical attacks and killing were commonplace in the capital. The organization said that while schools have re-opened, parents remain concerned about their children's safety.

Under Bremer, a career diplomat with a background in counter-terrorism issues, the CPA is now trying to improve the poor security situation as well as ensure a transition into a civilian authority run by Iraqis and provide public services and functioning public utilities. Bremer took over in early May from retired US General Jay Garner, who had headed the US' Office for Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance (ORHA); another top American diplomat charged with responsibility for Baghdad and Central Iraq was called back to Washington shortly after the media reported Garner's imminent replacement by Bremer.

The moves indicated the original transition team's failure to make progress at an acceptable rate, particularly on the security issue. On 15 May, Bremer indicated that the occupying forces would arrest many of the thousands of criminals released by the Saddam Hussein regime last year; officials announced that several hundred arrests in Baghdad as part of the "get tough" campaign. As for the increased military personnel being used in the new policy, the US army posted an additional 9,000 soldiers to Baghdad, an increase from 16,000 to 25,000 US soldiers, with the army now running 24-hour patrols in the city. Bremer announced the military police contingent of US forces would jump from 6,000 to 13,000 (in the capital, this would mean doubling the current force of 2,000).

However, considerable dissatisfaction with the CPA has arisen with Bremer's decision to eventually name a 35-member political council with which he would consult on policy matters and the appointment of Iraqis to ministry positions; the earlier plan had involved convening a national conference in July to form an interim Iraqi authority. Media reports indicated that representatives of the seven main political organizations that had been coordinating with the CPA were outraged that they were being sidelined while the public saw it as yet another delay in the formation of a functioning government that can meet basic needs. The CPA is reportedly dissatisfied with the level of representation that exile political organizations enjoy inside Iraq; officials also want to see women, tribal officials and Christians in the Iraqi political authority.

The CPA has made initial steps to transfer authority of day-to-day issues to town councils, which have been elected in Mosul, Kirkuk and Umm Qasr. One-person, one-vote elections for local councils did not and will not take place; instead, the councils are being selected by relatively small groups of several hundred community or tribal leaders. On 28 May, Abdel-Rahman Mustafa, a Kurd, was sworn in as mayor of Kirkuk and an Arab became deputy mayor. American forces organized the vote, which originally saw town representatives elect a 30-member council, with Kurds gaining the biggest bloc. Also in late May, USAID marked the handover of three democracy or capacity-building projects to the transitional town council in Umm Qasr, which include the first-ever access to the internet.

The first six weeks of CPA tenure in Iraq has seen mounting complaints about a lack of security and a range of public services, while Bremer's first moves have put almost half a million Iraqis out of work. The CPA decided on 16 May that some 30,000 senior Baath officials would be banned from public life; a week later, the army and the Information Ministry were dissolved, putting an estimated 400,000 Iraqis out of work without pensions or re-employment possibilities. Many of these individuals had no ties with the former regime. Bremer has reportedly promised that those untainted military personnel below the rank of lieutenant colonel can apply for assignment in the New Iraqi Corps, the new Iraqi military.

The policy of de-Baathification has not run smoothly due to varying criteria for retaining or appointing senior figures; Iraqis have complained that tainted figures have been selected for some civilian posts, while in other cases, Baath party members who did not deserve to be purged were excluded from certain positions. On 13 May, the Health Ministry announced that resignation of its top Iraqi official, Ali Shinan Janabi, due to his refusal to condemn the Baath Party, in which he had formerly been a member. A week later, coalition forces said that eight other senior Health Ministry officials would be replaced as well due to their ties with the party. Also on 13 May, the coalition forces told self-appointed Baghdad police chief, Hamid Rahman, an Interior Ministry official, to not come back to work. Rahman, who was attempting to fill the gap left by an earlier resignation of Zuheir al-Naimi, was accused of running his own clique within the force. Protests by bus drivers and electricity workers have demonstrated against the firing of dedicated officials or the appointment of tainted ones.

Also threatened by the CPA's actions is Iraq's manufacturing industry, since Bremer announced on 26 May that Iraq was open for business, signaling a flood of cheap imports that have forced the closure of many firms.

Demonstrations by out of work public sector employees, military personnel and others against the US and UK military presence have taken place almost daily in Baghdad and elsewhere.

To shore up the standard of living of public sector employees, the occupying forces in May adopted a policy of emergency payments of $20 to certain Iraqi police and civilian administrative personnel. According to Iraqi sources, out of approximately 6.5 million Iraqi families, around 2.5 million depended on the state for their income; this figure includes about 1 million civil servants. The coalition authority began making $20 payments to state employees and has begun paying pensioners $40. The latter payment is to tide over the country's 1.8 million pensioners until looted records can be reconstructed; the $20 payments were originally meant to be a one-time step but even coalition officials suspected that they might be continued for several months.

According to the Guardian (www.guardian.co.uk), Information Ministry employees received a final $50 payment upon being fired, while electricity workers received $100-500 salaries, as part of the system of boosting the salaries of civil professions and reducing the salaries of "security-related" employees.

Banks, meanwhile, have been closed since 20 March, and the exchange rates of the dinar have seen it appreciate against the USD rising from 4,000 during the war to between 1,200 and 1,500 afterward. This is due to the lack of liquidity in dinar in one hand and the [...]

After 12 debilitating years of economic sanctions following Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, the United Nations Security Council on 22 May passed Resolution 1483, which ended the sanctions regime and set up the outlines of a system to oversee postwar reconstruction. The resolution establishes a Development Fund for Iraq, to be held in Iraq's Central Bank. However, humanitarian needs, economic reconstruction and the repair of infrastructure, continued disarmament, the cost of the civilian administration and other purposes benefiting the people of Iraq are all supposed to be paid for out of this fund, which appears to cover various standard budgetary items. The fund will receive the proceeds of oil exports, while the only disbursing power is the Coalition Provisional Authority, in consultation with the Iraqi interim administration. The UN's Oil for Food Program is to be phased out over six months and oil sales are protected until the end of 2007 from any action to repay debt.

As a first step, the Development Fund for Iraq is expected to be the opening of accounts of more than $3 billion in oil revenues, now that the question of temporary responsibility for Iraq's oil is settled. After the resolution was passed, a senior Iraqi oil official said that by mid-June, production could be back up to roughly 1.5 million barrels per day, with about 650,000 barrels for internal consumption and the rest for export. Tamer Ghadban also predicted that the pre-war level of three million bpd could be reached by the end of summer (www.cnn.com).

The day after the resolution was passed, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan appointed Sergio Vieira de Mello, the UN high commissioner of human rights, as UN representative in Iraq for a four-month period. Annan has said that unlike what critics might believe, the resolution gives the UN responsibility for a range of issues: humanitarian relief, reconstruction, infrastructure rehabilitation, legal and judicial reforms, human rights and return of refugees (www.agoodplacetostart.org)

C - HUMAN COST

1 - Killed and Wounded

- Iraqi civilians: Figures on civilian casualties provided by the private organization IraqBodyCount (www.iraqbodycount.org) have grown significantly and steadily since the end of hostilities. It now estimates that a minimum of 5,531 and a maximum of 7,203 Iraqi civilians have been killed since the beginning of hostilities. A number of wounded that is at least three times the number of those killed is likely. This is compared to our report of 2 May, which gave the figure of at least 2,500 killed and 10,000 wounded; in our 12 May report, we quoted Iraq Body Count's figures of 2,233 (minimum) and 2,706 (maximum) and as of 21 May, the organization had estimated 4,065 (minimum) and 5,223 (maximum) casualties.

One jump in the figures apparently came from the figure of 1,482-2,009 dead counted in 19 Baghdad hospitals during the period of 19 March - 9 April. Also, the organization estimates that there have been at least 200 civilian deaths from cluster bombs, and perhaps 172 more than that figure. The organization, which appears to be the only party attempting to undertake a systematic effort in this regard, provides a detailed database for its figures, which were compiled by checking the reports of more than 60 leading news and media organizations and meticulously subtracting figures if there is the possibility of duplication in various media reports.

According to a survey by the Los Angeles Times (www.latimes.com), more than 1,700 civilians were killed and 8,000 injured in the battle for Baghdad alone. It also includes figures for the first 2 and 1/2 weeks after the city's fall on 9 April. William M. Arkin, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic Education at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, and a consultant and contributor to The Los Angeles Times, said that it probably will not be known until summer or later how many civilians died in Iraq but that the number will probably be "many thousands".

The post-war lawlessness in Iraq means that Iraqis are suffering from various types of violence - retribution murders and assassinations, random violence and crime-related killings. Car-jacking has become fairly common in the capital, according to news reports, as have revenge killing of Baath party members of others with ties to the former regime. On 18 May, the singer Daoud Qaisi was murdered in his Baghdad home; he headed the union of Iraqi artists and had glorified the regime. Also, unknown assailants (believed to be students) shot to death the deputy dean of the Faculty of Science at Baghdad's Mustansiriya University, reportedly because he harassed female students. In northern cities like Kirkuk, media reports indicate that despite generally calm conditions, a huge amount of weapons remain in the hands of Saddam Hussein supporters, increasing the possibility of violence. Some 10 people were killed over a single weekend in Kirkuk, in violence between Arabs and Kurds.

There remains the serious problem of unexploded ordinance, which continues to plague the country, especially its children. Various media reports have noted that young children, whose family economic conditions have prompted them to locate items that can be sold, have been the most affected by this phenomenon. On 12 May, six Iraqi children were killed and 10 injured in Basra when a bomb they were trying to dismantle exploded. They were trying to retrieve copper in order to sell it, according to press reports. According to the UN Integrated Regional Information Network (www.reliefweb.int), officials from the Mines Advisory Group (MAG) said they had removed 184,500 items of unexploded ordinance around Kirkuk and Mosul; more than 12,000 mines and booby traps have been cleared.

- Iraqi military: An unknown number of Iraqi military personnel, estimated in the thousands, were killed during the conflict. Speculation remains as to whether estimates of a few thousand killed are hiding a much larger number, or whether members of the various armed Iraqi military and paramilitary groups abandoned their positions and melted into the civilian population.

So far, no organizations or parties appear to be interested in looking into these figures and producing detailed casualty estimates for the Iraqi military and paramilitary groups.

- US-UK military: Figures provided by the CDI website indicate that 200 coalition forces had been killed through 6 June.

At least 600 US-UK military personnel have been injured.

- Other: An unknown number of non-Iraqis were killed, wounded or captured during the conflict; some media have begun to tell their stories as they make their way back to their countries of origin. Their numbers were originally given by the Iraqi regime and various media as 4,000 to 6,000 , while coalition forces have declined to specify their numbers as "unlawful combatants".

2 - Prisoners of war:

A late May report in the UK daily The Guardian (www.guardian.co.uk) alleged that some 3,000 Iraqi prisoners of war and other detainees were being held in compounds near Baghdad with no access for Red Cross officials; a reported mid-May mutiny by these detainees had been "dealt with" by US forces, according to the report.

Earlier in May, US military officials in Kuwait said that they had until that point released over 7,000 people, whether civilians, noncombatants or enemy prisoners of war (www.pentagon.gov). This figure, the officials said, includes a small number of alleged criminals picked up during post-war conditions of lawlessness. They said that 500 of the 2,000 remaining detainees would not likely be released; they fell into the following categories: high-ranking figures, criminals and unlawful combatants. There are no known prisoners of war belonging to coalition forces.

D - POPULATION MOVEMENTS (DISPLACED/REFUGEES)

Massive waves of refugees fleeing Iraq or seeking to return never materialized during the war or its aftermath. However, several important refugee issues have arisen, usually involving the thousands of internally-displaced persons (IDPs) in the country and raising concerns about human rights-related issues.

According to the UN International Organization of Migration (www.iom.org), thousands of people fled Iraq's major towns to the relative safety of the countryside during the conflict; many of these IDPs have since returned to their homes. In mid-May, IOM-designated NGOs began the long process of registering these people, living in scattered public buildings or in extended family structures.

The IOM has also begun assessing the difficult conditions faced by thousands of displaced Marsh Arabs, whose long-standing way of life was disrupted by the former regime. The IOM says that Marsh Arabs face the difficult choice of whether they should recreate their former life in the marshes or adapt to a new beginning.

On 12 May, the office of the UN humanitarian coordinator for Iraq (www.reliefweb.int) said it estimated that the stock of internally displaced in Iraq during the last 20 years between 700,000 and 1 million people. Some 600,000-800,000 IDPs are estimated to be located in the predominantly Kurdish north and 100,000 to 300,000 in the center and south.

Relief organizations report that several thousand persons have returned to the Kirkuk area; they have asked thousands of others who wish to do so to delay their move until the necessary facilities are in place. To tackle the issue of forced resettlement and displacement under the former regime, the US-established Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance said on 21 May that it would soon establish a committee to oversee the amicable settlement of property disputes. The office asked Iraqis to not settle conflicts over the ownership of a house, land or commercial establishment "by your own hand".

Occupation forces on the ground have on occasion responded to pressing questions of returning IDPs. In Kirkuk, US military personnel oversaw, according to media reports, an agreement to split profits from this year's harvest between Arabs and Kurdish returnees to lands that they had been forcibly displaced from. Despite the generally better levels of security in northern towns like Kirkuk, incidents of violence between Arabs and Kurds have taken place over the issue of returnees.

On 6 May, the IOM said that the first program to go ahead under the USAID-funded Iraq Transition Initiative (ITI) is rehabilitating a school in Umm Qasr. The project, worth $8 million, was launched three weeks earlier. The IOM said the project is designed to identify and address priority needs, with Iraqi participation, with an eye toward encouraging people to return and stabilizing populations. The Umm Qasr project was agreed upon with local input, the organization said. The project is also supposed to coordinate with local and national authorities to facilitate work on other areas - reintegrating internally displaced persons, refugees and former combatants. Other projects under discussion include encouraging the return of qualified Iraqis and setting up a workable compensation scheme for people to claim damages for lost property and other abuses during the Saddam Hussein regime.

In Geneva, the UN secretary-general's Representative on Internally Displaced Persons, Francis Deng, said the UN should be asked to help with the issue of internal refugees displaced by the previous regime. He said reconstruction and development funds, including oil revenues, should be used to help people return or obtain compensation for land and property lost, but in either case "fairness must be assured for the more than 200,000 Arabs" settled in the Kirkuk area by the former regime.

The ICRC (www.icrc.org) has also been active in keeping people in touch with each other, whether prisoners or Iraqis seeking to contact families abroad. This task is also being performed on an ad hoc basis by media such as BBC Arabic service and Al-Jazeera satellite television, which broadcasts an "open microphone" type of event in which residents of Iraq announce their identities and send reassuring messages to relatives outside the country. Large numbers of Iraqis outside the country are also taking part in this exercise to inform family members in Iraq of their situation.

Meanwhile, a field report by the United Nations Commission for Human Rights (www.unhcr.org) from an Iraqi refugee camp in Iran indicated that many of the 200,000 refugees in that country were anxious to return home. On 25 April, the UNHCR announced its preliminary plan to help 500,000 Iraqi refugees return to their country. About one-third of this figure, or 165,000, represents those refugees living in Iran (out of a total of 250,000) who are expected to return. The UNHCR expects the other refugees to return to come from the following groups: Iraqis in industrialized countries (35,000); neighboring countries, mostly Jordan and Syria (240,000); asylum seekers in other countries (60,000). A total of 900,000 refugees live outside Iraq, according to the UNHCR, which has at least $130 million budgeted for the repatriation plan.

According to the UNHCR, rising numbers of refugees in Iraq, particularly Iranian refugees in the south, were targeted by local residents. Around 1,200 refugees, mainly Iranian Kurds, remain in a no-man's land on the Jordanian border and some 1,000 Palestinians who received benefits under the former regime remain displaced in the capital, after being evicted by their landlords.

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