High water levels worsening humanitarian crisis in Mosul, UN agency says

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reported that high water levels of the Tigris left two key bridges in the Mosul area in north Iraq impassable this week, preventing displaced people from relocating to camps and emergency sites on the eastern bank, where the majority of space is available, a UN spokesman told reporters here Wednesday.

"Aid distributions in some camps and emergency sites were also affected, with suppliers unable to reach them," UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said at a daily news briefing here.

One of the bridges, at Nimrud, reopened on Tuesday for civilian traffic and use by humanitarian workers, he said.

However, a key bridge at Qayyarah is likely to take two or three more days to be repaired, the spokesman said. "It is expected that water levels will remain high for a few more days, and impact on distributions and camp construction work is likely to continue."

So far, more than 336,000 people have been displaced from western Mosul since the start of military operations on the western neighbourhoods in late February. The cumulative number of displaced people since the beginning of the Mosul operation last fall has reached 484,000 people.

The UN Population Fund's director for the Arab region, Luay Shabaneh, has just wrapped up a four-day visit to Iraq, where he met with displaced women and girls receiving services at the UN fund-supported health clinics in western and eastern Mosul.

Shabaneh said he was deeply moved by the stories he heard from those uprooted by the conflict, the spokesman added. Enditem