UN refugee agency delivers aid to people who fled Fallujah in Iraq

The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) on Friday began delivering emergency relief aid to families who recently escaped the besieged Iraqi city of Fallujah, a UN spokesman said here.

More than 800 people have fled Fallujah in recent days as Iraqi government forces continue their offensive against the Islamic State militants, the deputy UN spokesman, Farhan Haq, said at a daily news briefing here.

"Some 50,000 civilians still remain trapped inside, prevented from escaping by militants as the city continues to come under heavy bombardment by Iraqi forces," he said.

UNHCR and its partner, Muslim Aid, began distributing emergency relief items on Friday to families who were sheltering in a camp it has helped to set up in Amiriyat al-Falluja, in Anbar Governorate, he said.

The agency will also open two new camps next week in Habbaniyah Tourist City that will be able to accommodate 500 newly-displaced families, he said.

Meanwhile, the past month has seen a spike in numbers of Iraqi refugees risking the dangerous crossing into Syria in a desperate bid to escape Mosul, which is the IS also known by its Arabic acronym Daesh, and fighting in surrounding areas.

Since the beginning of May, a total of 4,266 refugees have arrived at the Al-Hol camp located 14 kilometers from the Iraqi border in Syria's north-eastern Hasakah Governorate, he said.

In anticipation of further arrivals in the coming weeks, the first of five UNHCR airlifts of emergency items such as tents and blankets arrived from Jordan to Qamishli in the far north of Hasakah Governorate on Thursday, Haq said.

The total amount of aid arriving will be enough to provide support for up to 50,000 people, including refugees and the immediate host community, he added.

After initial shelling on Fallujah and IS positions in other areas in the early morning hours of Monday, the troops covered by U.S.-led coalition and Iraqi aircrafts advanced toward the edges of Fallujah as well as the nearby small towns of Garma and Saqlawiyah.

During the past few months, security forces and allied Hashd Shaabi units carried out operations around Fallujah so as to tighten the troops' grip on the besieged city and nearby small towns in order to free them from IS militants.

Government troops and allied militias have currently been fighting for months to reclaim key cities and towns in Anbar from IS militants, who attempted to advance toward the Iraqi capital of Baghdad after seizing most of Anbar province. Endit