France to continue its support for camps in Kurdistan: French Official
“Over the past couple of years, we have spent 17 million Euros specifically in the Kurdistan Region for refugees and displaced people. We will still carry on with our support.”
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan 24) – France will continue its support to the Kurdistan Region’s humanitarian efforts and called on the need to focus on psychosocial needs of refugees and Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), a French diplomat said on Tuesday.
French Consul General Dominique Mas, while visiting Kawergosk camp in the Kurdistan Region, told Kurdistan 24 France would continue its humanitarian support to the region.
“Over the past couple of years, we have spent 17 million Euros specifically in the Kurdistan Region for refugees and displaced people. We will still carry on with our support,” Mas said.
The French diplomat mentioned that he believes the upcoming conference in Kuwait for the reconstruction of Iraq would be good opportunity to refocus efforts into psychosocial services for those who were affected by the war against the Islamic State (IS).
“It will be the time for us to try to plan and program more projects, specifically new projects supporting the youth, supporting psychosocial and psychiatric activities,” he said.
Mas stressed that responding to those needs was “important if we want to build a new Iraq.”
The Kurdistan Region has been home to over 1.5 million Iraqi displaced people and Syrian refugees since the emergence of IS. Kurdish officials have repeatedly criticized Baghdad for failing to send sufficient aid to support humanitarian efforts in the camps.
The Iraqi federal government also imposed an international flight ban on the Kurdistan Region which has affected the deliverance of humanitarian assistance.