Forced Migration in the OIC Member Countries:
Policy Framework Adopted by Host Countries
26
and atrocities.15 Since the war began over half of the country’s prewar population has been
displaced: 6.6 million internally, and over 5 million across international borders, according to
UNHCR.16
Civilians have fled atrocities committed by the government and rebel groups, including the use
of chemical weapons, large-scale bombing campaigns, and sieges of cities. The complete
absence of rule of law has obliged those who do not wish to join the war to flee, especially
persecuted minority groups. Men in areas controlled by the Assad regime are forced into
military service, and may be called into action until the age of 42.17 Those who refuse are
imprisoned and/or tortured, and those who escape to rebel-held areas may face the same fate.
This fear of conscription has pushed many young men to seek refuge in neighboring countries,
often at the behest of their families.
Iraq has seen a long history of forced displacement, beginning well before the current phase of
ethnic and religious conflict.18 At the time of the US invasion in 2003, 400,000 Iraqi refugees
were recognized worldwide, with over half residing in Iran.19 By 2006 and 2007, at the height
of what became a sectarian war, an estimated 5 million Iraqis had been displaced.20 Even after
the withdrawal of the Multi-National Forces from Iraq in 2011, continued sectarian violence
and a weak economy, partially due to falling oil prices, have pushed an increasing number of
Iraqis to flee the country. In September 2014, two-thirds of new arrivals to Jordan from Iraq
had fled conflict areas, reporting fears of forced marriage, kidnapping, threats, and other
forms of violence.21
Other populations have also been displaced by national and international conflicts. The
Palestinians under the aegis of UNRWA were originally displaced during repeated wars
between Israel and its neighboring Arab countries in 1948 and 1967. More recently in 2015,
civil war broke out in Yemen between the government and Houthi rebels, a Shiite minority
group based in the northeast of the country.22 As of April 2016, the Regional Mixed Migration
Secretariat (RMMS) reported that 177,000 people had fled Yemen since the outbreak of
hostilities—mostly to Oman, Saudi Arabia, and Djibouti.23 If the situation does not improve,
some fear that the Yemeni Civil War could provoke even larger mass flows of forced migration
15 BBC News, “Syria: The story of the conflict,” BBC News, March 11, 2016
16 UNHCR, Global Trends: Forced Displacement in 2015; Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, Global Report on Internal
Displacement 2016 (Geneva: IDMC, 2016)
Al Jazeera, “Syria’s Civil War Explained.”
17 Beginning in March 2012, men of military age have also not been allowed to leave the country legally. Rochelle Davis,
Abbie Taylor and Emma Murphy, “Gender, conscription and protection, and the war in Syria,” Forced Migration Review no.
47 (September 2014): 35-36
18 Many Iraqis sought safety during the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war. Others fled political repression under the Baathist regime
of Saddam Hussein, especially the Arabization campaigns directed against the Kurdish minority.
19 UNHCR, “New Hope for Iraqi Refugees in Iran,” updated April 23, 2003
20 IRIN, “Iraq 10 years on: The forgotten displacement crisis,” updated April 23, 2013,
21 Refugees have also reported fleeing ongoing violence in Baghdad and Basra. UNHCR, “Sharp increase in Iraqi refugees
fleeing ISIS into Jordan and Turkey,” updated September 23, 2014
22 Hashem Ahelbarra, “Yemen crisis explained,” Al Jazeera, January 20, 2015,
European Council on
Foreign Relations, “Mapping the Yemen Conflict,” accessed July 30, 2016
23 Regional Mixed Migration Secretariat, “Yemen Country Profile,” updated May 2016,