It is estimated that due to emigration and forced expulsion between 1975 and 2007, seven million Iraqis are living outside their country.
Not unlike the Palestinian refugees, the problem of Iraqi refugees is increasingly becoming a chronic problem, with no solution in sight. There are as many as two million Iraqis in Syria.
Dr. Abdul Samad Abdul-Rahman, Iraq's minister for immigrants and deportees, drew attention to "a horrible humanitarian situation" as reflected in the incarceration of a large number of teenage girls in Syrian prisons and detention camps.
[The minister did not offer explanation about the exact number or the reasons for the girls' incarceration.]
Source: Al-Mada, Iraq, July 2, 2009
