Sunday 16 / March / 2025
Baghdad: More than 70 tents were destroyed by fire on Monday in the refugee camp of Yahayawa, near the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, but no one was injured, the United Nations' refugee agency UNHCR said.
The ministry of displacement and migration "has requested us to provide tents and core relief items CRIs to affected families", UNHCR spokeswoman in Baghdad, Caroline Gluck, said.
"We will respond with tents and CRIs without delay; the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian affairs is coordinating with other clusters to provide any other assistance needed," she said in an email.
The war with IS has forced about 3.4 million people to leave their homes across Iraq, the UN says.
Last week, the UNHCR said that hundreds of thousands more people could be uprooted by the military assault to dislodge the militants from Mosul, the biggest city still under IS control, in northern Iraq.
The Yahayawa camp houses about 500 internally displaced families and is managed by the provincial council.
Meanwhile, the Iraqi oil ministry said that Iraq has put out fires at four oil wells in the oil-producing region of Qayyara which Iraqi forces recaptured from IS last week.
"Work is underway to put out flames in the remaining wells or oil spots that Daesh criminal gangs set ablaze before fleeing the city," Deputy Oil Minister Fayadh Al Nema said in the statement.
He didn't say how many fires were still ablaze.
The Qayyara region produces heavy sour crude and has a small refinery to process some of the oil.
Late on Sunday, IS claimed a suicide bombing that killed at least 15 people and injured 16 at a wedding party near the city of Kerbala.
Five assailants including the suicide bomber attacked the celebration in Ain Al Tamr, west of Kerbala in southern Iraq, firing machine guns and throwing hand grenades, the police said. All the attackers were killed by security forces.
The bombing is the first in the Kerbala region since Iraqi forces dislodged IS militants from their stronghold in Falluja, 80km (50 miles) north of city.
A statement on the Amaq news agency that supports IS said the attack was carried out by four of its suicide fighters against a "gathering".
Initial reports in local media late, citing security sources, blamed the killings on a dispute between two tribes at the wedding party.
