IRIN: Iraqi refugees returning because of lack of money, not "improving security situation"

[sabra]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/IRIN/35c8ef33f3c1f04c9173eb8aa69d7c17.htm

BAGHDAD, 12 November 2007 (IRIN) - Broke and desperate, Ziad Qahtan Naeem and his family have returned to their house in war-battered Baghdad, a move they likened to a "death sentence".

The six-member Shia family fled the Sunni-dominated Mansour neighbourhood of western Baghdad nearly two years ago and took refuge in Syria, joining more than one million Iraqis there.

But they have become part of a growing wave of Iraqis leaving Syria - not because they are confident of Iraq's future but because they have run out of money.

...

Over 46,000 return in October

The Iraqi government has said the number of Iraqis returning was growing, with more than 46,000 people coming home in October.

According to a government spokesman, Brig. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi, 46,030 people returned to Iraq in October alone from neighbouring countries. He attributed the large number to the "improving security situation".

"The level of terrorist operations has dropped in most of the capital's neighbourhoods, due to the good performance of the armed forces," al-Moussawi told a press conference on 7 November in the heavily guarded Green Zone. He did not give returnee numbers before October.

[IndyOp]

1. I knew that - glad to see it in print. (n/t)

[Teaser]

2. Additionally Syria

has closed its borders and throwing refugees out.

They're coming home, but homeless.