DAMASCUS, Syria — The vast majority of Iraqis who fled their country have no plans to return even though violence is way down, with many hoping instead to resettle in the West.
The trends, uncovered on the basis of scores of interviews by The Associated Press and confirmed by Iraqi government and United Nations figures, raise the possibility that countries like Syria and Egypt — poor themselves — could face a significant refugee problem for years to come.
Iraq has lost a large portion of the urban, educated, predominantly Sunni Muslim and Christian middle-class whose skills would be vital to its rebuilding.
“Life here is better. My children can play outside and I know they’ll come back. You never know what’s going to happen there,” said Taghrid Hadi, who fled Iraq in September 2006 after gunmen kidnapped and killed her husband.
Hadi, 34, and other relatives are waiting for word on their applications to be resettled in a third country. “Anywhere but Iraq, I don’t care where,” she said.
More than 2 million refugees remain outside Iraq, mostly in the Sunni countries of Syria, Jordan and Egypt, according to the International Organization of Migration and the U.N. high commissioner for refugees. Only about 16,000 refugees — less than 1 percent — have returned from abroad, said Karim al-Saedi, an Iraqi Migration Ministry official.
