Honorary Presidents: Lord Avebury, Parliamentary Human Rights Group

Professor Kevin Boyle, Director of Human Rights Centre, University of Essex.

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*Appeal: Help Victims of Iraqi Ethnic Cleansing

 To all organizations and persons concerned with human rights

 I recently visited the camps of those people displaced by the Iraqi regime from the 
Kirkuk region in Iraqi Kurdistan, in particular, those of Barda-Qaraman, midway
between Kirkuk and Sulaimani, and Beneslawa near Arbil.

 They live in dire poverty and misery with only flimsy nylon tents as shelter from the
elements and no facilities other than food from aid organizations and water which 
must be carried some distance from a communal tap.  Medical facilities are 
almost non-existent and only the most basic treatment is available.  Most of them 
are without work, without hope, and some of them have been there for more than
three years.  This hopelessness has been the cause of many of the young men
trying to make their way to Europe and, in doing so, some of them have lost their lives. 

 The Iraqi regime continues to expel more and more families from their homes and 
land for the simple reason that they are not Arabs.  Arab families are brought in and
settled in their houses.

 We ask all human rights organizations and concerned persons to support our appeal
and to bring pressure to bear on their governments, through UN organizations, to
intervene to end this inhuman policy.  We also ask the international aid organizations 
to do everything possible to relief the distress of the displaced people who now 
number about 120,000 and who are dispersed throughout the region of Kurdistan
under the control of the Kurds.

 Nouri Talabany

Director