'People have sold their homes and lands to pay for the trip.' Once a prosperous region, northern Iraq now offers little hope to its inhabitants
An influx of desperate refugees and asylum seekers on the eastern frontier of the European Union has ignited a diplomatic crisis, which has drawn in regional powers such as Germany and Russia.
“It seems no one in Iraqi Kurdistan has any guarantee about what’s going to happen in the future. Everyone wants to just get out for a better life in Europe,” says Mahmood Yaseen Kurdi, a journalist-based in Sulaymaniyah, Iraq. Mismanagement of natural resources, such as the water supply, has led to deadly protests in cities like Basra.
Many Iraqis have flown to Istanbul and then hopped onto connecting flights to Minsk. Turkey on Friday banned Iraqi , Syrian and Yemeni citizens from using its airports to fly to Belarus. “But whether it’s a manufactured crisis or not is another question. At the moment, these people are on the border and asking for protection. They need support.”
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