ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The European Commission today announced €2.5 million in humanitarian aid for the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) to provide emergency reproductive and gender-based violence care for women and girls in internally displaced person (IDP) camps in Iraq.

UNFPA work enabled by the funding aims to reach over 100,000 women and girls with emergency obstetric care and emergency supplies in central and western parts of the country.

“The impact of the war in Iraq continues to take a devastating toll on the population, especially women and girls in hard-to-reach areas and camps for the internally displaced”, said Dr Oluremi Sogunro, UNFPA Representative to Iraq said in a statement.

She thanked the European Union (EU) for their contribution and said the funds would go towards helping “hundreds of thousands of women and girls in need of these life-saving interventions across the country.”

The funding also hopes to ensure specialized services to gender-based violence survivors, namely the clinical management of rape, case management, and psychosocial support, the statement added.

According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), 1.7 million of a total 5.9 million IDPs in Iraq are still yet to return home after Islamic State swept through swathes of north and west Iraq, causing a civilian exodus.

Women and girls account for half of Iraq’s IDP population, 35% of whom are of reproductive age (between 15 and 45 years old), says the IOM.

Issues of reproductive health in Iraq extend beyond IDP and refugee camps. Iraq suffers from high rates of maternal mortality and weak reproductive health and family planning services countrywide. Women marrying young and the stigma in accessing reproductive health information also contribute to challenges.

The EU has funded UNFPA projects since 2015, but funding still has a long way to go. Prior to the EC allocation, the UNFPA recorded a $15.6 million shortfall in funds in its 2018-19 round-up.

Finding common ground for approvals from the international community on policy has also encumbered reproductive care and gender-based violence responses.

When human rights lawyer Amal Clooney along with Nobel Peace Prize laureates Nadia Murad and Dr. Denis Mukwege, spoke of justice for those who face sexual violence in conflict at the UN Security Council in April, the resolution adopted by the council after they spoke was watered down to win approval, fearing language on providing “sexual and reproductive health care” to survivors of rape and abuse could provoke a veto from the Trump administration.

Rudaw