Nov 5, 2002 5 min read

AMMAN, Jordan (AP) – Fearing a repeat of the refugee crisis sparked by the Gulf War and its aftermath, aid agencies and governments are quietly drawing up plans and stockpiling supplies to help Iraqis who may flee their country if new fighting breaks out. Neighboring countries, which took in more than 3 million displaced people a decade ago, hope to avoid a flood of migrants by sealing their borders and setting up refugee camps inside Iraq. Aid officials doubt, however, that the flow of frightened Iraqis can be halted at the border.

Either way, huge amounts of supplies could be needed on short notice. International relief agencies are rapidly trying to fill warehouses in the region.

“All of them are preparing for what should happen if there should be a reason for people to flee,” said Roland Huguenin of the International Committee of the Red Cross. He was bound for Baghdad with a team of doctors Monday.

Most worrying is a scenario in which a cornered Saddam Hussein unleashes the biological or chemical weapons that Washington alleges he has – harming civilians in the process.

“Here is the nightmare,” said Jamal Hattar, director of Caritas operations in Jordan. “I cannot pretend we have the capacity to respond to such a thing.”

Christer Aqvist, head of the regional delegation of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, said antibiotics or other antidotes are not part of the stockpiles. “But of course we can easily mobilize.”

Red Crescent societies from all of Iraq’s neighbors – Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iran and Turkey – held an unpublicized meeting in Geneva on Oct. 16-17 to coordinate contingency plans. The Iraqi Red Crescent Society participated by phone, Aqvist said.

Talks have also been under way with U.N. agencies, but preparations have been kept low-profile to avoid giving the impression that war is imminent or inevitable.

“If you buy two bottles of water, people say, ‘Oh, do you know something?”‘ Aqvist said. “The Red Cross is not expecting war. I hope war will not come. But if war is coming, we have to be prepared.”

The federation had planned to stock six warehouses inside Iraq with $1.5 million worth of tents, blankets, heaters, kerosene lamps and personal items like soap by the end of 2003.

But “based on the current political situation,” officials decided to try to meet that goal by the end of this year, Aqvist said. They’re also building up stocks in other countries.

Most governments are expected to try to keep displaced people in Iraq, to avoid being saddled with the burden of taking them in.

But persuading frightened people to stay in border camps may not be easy, especially if there is fighting nearby. Many also will want to join relatives living in neighboring countries.

“The prospect of staying in a camp within a country that you’re trying to flee … seems to me very improbable,” said Geraldine Chatelard, an expert on Iraqi refugees at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy.

About 1.25 million Iraqis fled into Iran during the 1991 Gulf War and an ensuing, failed uprising against Saddam in southern Iraq. About 500,000 are still there, Chatelard estimates.

This time, Iran has drawn up plans to shelter up to 900,000 people in camps “just inside Iraqi soil,” the official Islamic Republic News Agency quoted an Interior Ministry official, Ahmad Hosseini, as saying.

Few Iraqis are expected to try to enter Kuwait, where anti-Iraq sentiment remains from Saddam’s 1990 invasion. Kuwait has already sealed its border area even to Kuwaitis while military exercises with U.S. forces are under way.

Most of the 33,000 Iraqis who fled into Saudi Arabia a decade ago have since returned, and the Saudi government has not commented on whether it would take more.

Refugees also fled into Turkey and Syria in the aftermath of the Gulf war.

This time, the two countries are readying for up to 210,000 refugees, but are expected to try to hold them at or near their borders with Iraq.

An estimated 1.5 million people ended up in Jordan after the Gulf war, including about 300,000 Jordanian-Palestinian workers expelled from Kuwait after it was liberated by a U.S.-led coalition. The rest were mainly Asians or Egyptian workers who since have been sent home.

After 12 years of crippling U.N. sanctions, far fewer migrant workers are believed remain in Iraq. But an estimated 60,000 Palestinian and other foreign students might head for Jordan.

Again this time, Jordan insists it will only admit Iraqis heading to a third country, saying it lacks the resources to settle new refugees. About 300,000 Iraqis are in Jordan now, most technically illegal.

About half of Jordan’s 5.2 million people are of Palestinian origin, many of whom oppose Jordan’s 1994 peace with Israel and support Saddam. The government also worries Israel may expel more people from the Palestinian territories if a war with Iraq erupts.

Of Iraq’s neighbors, only Turkey and Iran have signed all international agreements on accepting and caring for refugees. But in the end, public pressure may force all the surrounding countries to open their doors once again, aid officials say.

“What do you do when people are actually standing there on the border?” Huguenin said. “It will very quickly become a major problem because you can’t keep a large number of people in the desert.”