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Restoration of Iraqi Border Villages Allegedly Tied to Elections

Plans to restore and repopulate Iraq’s border villages destroyed during its war with Iran have been met with accusations of electioneering from Kurdish politicians, writes Omar al-Shaher.
Members of the Iraqi Mine and Unexploded Ordnance Clearance Organization (IMCO) work to find mines in the Shatt-al-Arab district, in Iraq's southern city of Basra, November 6, 2012. Decades of war have left Iraq with one of the worst mine problems in the world, according to UNICEF, with around 20 million anti-personnel mines and more than 50 million cluster bombs believed to be left over in border areas and southern oilfields. Iraq's Environment Ministry says there are 25 million landmines scattered around
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For weeks, numerous Iraqi politicians have been speaking about a bundle of development projects in the country, including reviving the thousands of border villages that were abandoned and decimated during the Iran-Iraq war. However, some contend that “these rumors are merely propaganda for the approaching local elections."

Members of parliament say that it is the responsibility of the government to find a solution for the problem affecting hundreds of thousands of Iraqis who fled from their villages in the central, northern and southern border regions. These dislocated people left their homes due to the Iran-Iraq war, or because of the al-Anfal Campaign, which former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s regime carried out against the Kurds.

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