Baghdad, Iraq, 5 October 2017 – As the military operations to retake Hawija continue, more than 30,000 people have been displaced since September 21st. Of those, 12,500 have returned. To meet the urgent needs of these women and girls, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), with the generous contribution from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA), supported the deployment of a mobile delivery room, along with a Gender-Based Violence (GBV) response mobile team inside re-taken areas of Hawija district. Five mobile integrated GBV response and Reproductive Health (RH) teams have also been deployed to the screening sites receiving IDPs from Hawija in Kirkuk, Salahuddin and Ninewa. These locations are the first receiving sites of IDPs from Hawija. Additionally, the contribution from the Government of Sweden has allowed the establishment of GBV and RH services in Beiji centre, Salahuddin.

UNFPA is currently supporting 35 RH services serving people in need from Hawija. These include facilities in screening sites, camps and in host communities. The services include static and mobile facilities. UNFPA also supports 5 mobile GBV response teams and more than 15 women community centres in these locations. These services ensure that life-saving reproductive health and protection services are available to the women in and from Hawija. Sweden’s contribution has made service provision in many of these facilities possible.

Mr. Ramanathan Balakrishnan, UNFPA Representative in Iraq said, “UNFPA in Iraq will continue to provide front-line emergency response to the most vulnerable women and girls to ensure that the displaced women and girls have access to protection services including Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (SGBV) response services and Reproductive Health services, including emergency obstetric care.”

      
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UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, delivers a world where every pregnancy is wanted, every childbirth is safe and every young person’s potential is fulfilled.

For more information or media inquiries, please contact: Sahand Mohammed (samohammed@unfpa.org)