Numerous news outlets and human rights groups have in recent months reported on Iraq’s increasing detention and deportation of Syrian refugees, in a breach of its non-refoulement obligations. Deportees have included registered asylum seekers with UNHCR documents as well as people with valid Iraqi residence permits. Reports also suggest that there are growing public calls in Iraq to similarly target Afghan refugees for deportation.
In a recent report, Human Rights Watch revealed that Iraqi authorities have arbitrarily detained and deported Syrian refugees to Damascus and other parts of Syria under the control of Kurdish-led forces. Some of the deportees possessed official Iraqi documents and were lawfully residing and working in the country, while others were registered asylum seekers with the UNHCR office. According to the report, “Deporting asylum seekers breaches Iraq’s obligations as a party to the UN Convention Against Torture (CAT) and under the customary international law principle of nonrefoulment.”
Iraq hosts around 300,000 refugees and asylum seekers, predominantly from Syria, Iran, Türkiye, and the state of Palestine. There are over 260,000 Syrian refugees in the country, the majority of whom reside in urban areas, while others are held in nine refugee camps; 90 percent of Iraq’s refugee population lives in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI).
According to Le Monde, public sentiment in Iraq is also hardening against Afghan refugees. The French newspaper repots in late August that there has been a surge in online petitions “calling for the deportation of Afghan nationals,” which have been “orchestrated on social media” with “tacit support of the authorities.”
Syrian Returnees Face Abuses and Persecutions
Syria has long been considered unsafe for returning refugees. According to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, “In view of the serious violations of international humanitarian law and violations and abuses of human rights law and ongoing armed conflict in Syria, UNHCR continues to characterize the flight of civilians from Syria as a refugee movement, with the vast majority of Syrian asylum-seekers continuing to be in need of international refugee protection.”
In October 2021, HRW reported that Syrian refugees who returned to Syria between 2017 and 2021 faced serious human rights abuses and persecution at the hands of the Syrian government and affiliated militias, including arbitrary detention, torture, kidnappings, extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, and sexual violence. More recently, in March 2024, the UN Syria Commission of Inquiry reported a new wave of violence in Syria, such as attacks on civilians and infrastructure amounting to war crimes. “Syria remains the world’s largest displacement crisis with over 13 million Syrians unable to return to their homes,” said Commissioner Hanny Megally.
Unlawful Deportations
Despite a ban on the deportation of Syrian refugees issued by the Supreme Judicial Council of Iraq in August 2023, reports reveal that Iraqi authorities have continued to widely detain Syrian Kurdish refugees based on residency issues. In April 2024, the Kurdistan Regional Government suspended entry visas for Syrian citizens, reportedly under the request of the federal government in Baghdad amidst broader efforts to regulate foreign labour in Iraq and to restrict Syrians’ ability to enter the Kurdistan region.
HRW interviewed several Syrian refugees who claimed to have been arrested at their workplace, on the streets or at residency offices while trying to renew their permits. The interviewees were either registered with UNHCR or had a valid Iraqi residence permit, yet the authorities reportedly did not consider their asylum status nor provide opportunities to appeal their deportation orders. According to the report, all the Syrians interviewed were summarily deported, and some were threatened with continued detention if they did not leave the country.
Iraq’s arbitrary deportations raise serious concerns over the safety of Syrian refugees in their home country, where abuses and persecution are ongoing. “Iraq should immediately end its distressing campaign of arbitrary arrests and deportations of Syrians who have fled to Iraq for safety,” said an Iraq researcher at HRW, “By forcibly returning asylum seekers to Syria, Iraq is knowingly placing them in harm’s way.” The report also says that the Kurdistan Regional Government acknowledges Syrians as asylum seekers, which makes them eligible to obtain humanitarian residence permits once registered with UNHCR. “The Iraqi government is obligated to ensure that Syrian asylum seekers’ rights are protected in accordance with both international refugee law and the ruling of the Supreme Judicial Council,” says HRW.
Immigration Detention in Iraq
To date, the Global Detention Project has been unable to identify many details about Iraq’s immigration detention regime, which is documented on the GDP’s Iraq country page.
Despite the paltry details, UNHCR’s 2022 Annual Report on Iraq clearly indicates that the detention of refugees and asylum seekers is a factor in Iraq’s enforcement policies: “In 2022, UNHCR registered 30,301 new asylum seekers in Iraq, providing them with UNHCR certificates, which allows them to prove their identity, protect against arbitrary arrest, detention and forcible returns to countries of origin and facilitates their access to essential public services including residency, education and medical care. … UNHCR partners continued providing specialized case management and psychosocial support to vulnerable refugees, complemented by ongoing efforts to strengthen the domestic asylum mechanisms and better enforce the non-refoulement principle; such efforts led to better recognition of UNHCR certificates by judges, which in turn resulted in fewer arrests and detention of asylum-seekers and refugees.”
As the recent HEW reports indicates, however, the possession of UNHCR documents appears to be increasingly ineffective in preventing detention and deportation. According to one case HRW documented in its June 2024 report: “A 43-year-old Syrian man from Aleppo was detained at a checkpoint in Diwaniyah city south of Baghdad. After 12 days in detention, he was brought before a judge and presented his UNHCR asylum seeker certificate to no avail. He received a fine and a deportation order to Syria. Although he has filed an appeal, his lawyer said that his chances of success are slim. ‘My life is in danger in Syria,’ the man told Human Rights Watch. ‘I can’t go back to Aleppo, and I don’t want to go to northeast Syria.’ His 16-year-old son has been detained in Karrada, Baghdad, since April 14 for violating residency laws, while his other son has been detained since March 19, also for violating residency laws, without being brought before a judge. He was the only one interviewed who had been given the opportunity to appeal his deportation order. None of the other Syrians interviewed had appeared before a judge during or after their detention, and all were summarily deported.”
According to Iraq’s Law on the Residence of Foreigners (Article 48): “The Director General or his authorized representative shall have the power of an investigating judge in accordance with the provisions of the Criminal Procedure Code, which shall allow him to detain a foreigner for a period not exceeding (7) seven days which may be extended in order to deport or expel the foreigner from the territories of the Republic of Iraq.”
