UN to move Palestinian refugees from Iraq-Syria border camp to Slovakia

Published Tuesday 21/07/2009 (updated) 21/07/2009 21:36  – Ma’an/Agencies –

Nearly one hundred Palestinian refugees stranded in Iraq’s western desert will be temporarily relocated to Slovakia, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNCHR) said.

The 98 Palestinians, who were living in "appalling conditions" in makeshift camps near the Syrian border for more than six years, will be housed in a “transit camp” in Slovakia beginning in August, the agency said.

“They will stay at the new centre for up to six months while their final resettlement to other countries is arranged," UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond told a news briefing in Geneva, according to Reuters.

According to UNHCR, Romania opened a similar camp last year, and the US, Chile, and several European countries have taken in many of the thousands of Palestinians who were stranded after the start of the US-led occupation of Iraq in 2003.

Many Palestinians originally settled in Iraq after they had been expelled from Mandate Palestine by Zionist forces in the 1948 war that saw the creation of Israel. Others arrived in 1967 and in the 1990s. Before the 2003 invasion, UNHCR estimated there were 34,000 Palestinians in Iraq.

After continuous attacks by local Iraqis, the first of the Palestinians now in Al-Walid border camp fled Baghdad in 2003 but were not allowed to enter Syria, the UN refugee agency said.

At the end of May, there were more than 2,700 Palestinians living in three desert camps on the Iraq-Syria border. A furthermore 10,000 Palestinian refugees are in Baghdad, UNHCR said in a statement.