UN: Over one million Iraqis are in need of 'desperate assistance' this winter

Spokesperson for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Jens Laerke said on Tuesday that the UN in Iraq is calling for an additional $173 million to help Iraq’s 1.2 million internally displaced refugees to prepare for the harsh conditions of winter.

In a press briefing held at the UN office in Geneva, Laerke added that, “Overall, some 5.2 million people [are] in need of aid and protection across Iraq. The $173 million [is] a subset of the humanitarian response plan requesting $2.2 billion and would be used to fund prioritised, time-critical winterisation programmes.”

He noted that 1.9 million Iraqis have been displaced across Iraq since January 2014, “nearly half of them [are] in the high altitude areas of the Kurdistan Region where temperatures in the winter could drop below zero. The displaced needed immediate shelter, warm clothing and shoes, food, heating, cooking fuel and health services.”

The OCHA spokesperson also pointed out that about 1.1 million Iraqi children would require additional health care throughout the winter.