- Title: Hundreds more flee the eastern suburbs of Mosul amid missile attacks
- Date: 8th January 2017
- Summary: ZUHOOR NEIGHBOURHOOD, EASTERN MOSUL, IRAQ (JANUARY 8, 2017) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF IRAQIS CARRYING THEIR BELONGINGS AND WALKING OUT OF THE ZUHOOR NEIGHBOURHOOD OF EASTERN MOSUL BOY PUSHING A CART WITH BAGS ON IT / PEOPLE WALKING VARIOUS OF PEOPLE LEAVING THE AREA CHILDREN CARRYING BAGS AND WALKING / MEN PUSHING CART WITH GIRL ON IT SOLDIER WALKING WITH PEOPLE LEAVING THE NEIGHBOURHOOD VARIOUS OF PEOPLE WALKING OLD MAN BEING PUSHED ON A CART WOMAN PUSHING HER BELONGINGS IN A PUSHCHAIR VARIOUS OF A MAN PUSHING A CART WITH BLANKETS TIED TO IT VARIOUS OF PEOPLE LEAVING THE AREA WOMAN HOLDING A BABY IN A CARRIER VARIOUS OF ELDERLY MAN BEING PUSHED IN A WHEELCHAIR VARIOUS OF PEOPLE LEAVING THE AREA (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) MAN FLEEING THE RECAPTURED MUTHANNA NEIGHBOURHOOD, ABU AHMAD, SAYING: AHMAD: "The situation in the camp is difficult. We lived through all the air strikes and shelling to end up in a tent. We'd rather stay in our homes." JOURNALIST: "Are you not scared of the strikes here, the ongoing clashes?" AHMAD: "It's upon God's will. All these people have stayed home; they do not want to leave. Why would you leave your belongings and property and go to the camps?" JOURNALIST: "Are you taking your family to Bawiza?" AHMAD: "I will go and see the area first, then come back for my family and take them to Bawiza. God willing the area will be fine." AHMAD DUCKING TO THE SOUND OF MISSILE / PEOPLE RUNNING FROM THE STREET / COUNTER-TERRORISM SOLDIERS / SOUND OF EXPLOSION VARIOUS OF SMOKE RISING FROM THE SITE OF THE EXPLOSION PEOPLE LEAVING THE AREA PEOPLE GREETING EACH OTHER CART WITH WOMEN AND CHILDREN VARIOUS OF COUNTER TERRORISM SERVICE VEHICLES DRIVING THROUGH THE AREA BOY PULLING CART WITH BAGS / AUDIO OF GUNFIRE PEOPLE LEAVING THE AREA
- Embargoed: 23rd January 2017 14:12
- Keywords: Iraq Mosul army eastern militants gunfire missile displaced
- Location: ZUHOOR NEIGHBOURHOOD, EASTERN MOSUL, IRAQ
- City: ZUHOOR NEIGHBOURHOOD, EASTERN MOSUL, IRAQ
- Country: Iraq
- Topics: Conflicts/War/Peace,Military Conflicts
- Reuters ID: LVA0015Y7Z3NR
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: Hundreds of residents continue to flee Mosul's eastern neighbourhoods on Sunday (January 8), as the Iraqi army carried on with the second phase of the offensive against Islamic State militants.
Mosul is the biggest city held by the ultra-hardline Sunni Islamist group in Iraq and Syria and the Iraqi government hopes its recapture would mark the end of the Islamic State in Iraq.
Men, women and children were leaving the recently recaptured Mosul's Zuhoor neighbourhood hoping to find safety in camps.
Others, like Abu Ahmad, were hoping to stay with relatives living in safer places.
For Ahmad, the decision to leave his neighbourhood of Muthanna was not easy.
"We lived through all the air strikes and shelling to end up in a tent? We'd rather stay in our homes. Why would you leave your belongings and property and go to the camps?" he said.
After his neighbourhood was captured by the elite Counter-Terrorism Service Forces, Ahmad said he was thinking of taking his family to stay with relatives in the nearby village of Bawiza.
"I will go and see the area first, then come back for my family and take them to Bawiza. God willing the area will be fine."
The interview was interrupted by the sound of a nearby missile attack and Ahmad ducked onto the ground.
More than 125,000 people have been displaced out of a population of roughly 1.5 million, the U.N. refugee agency said. The numbers of those fleeing have increased by 50 percent over the last few days and is now about 2,300 a day, the agency also said.
The humanitarian situation was "dire", with food stockpiles dwindling and the price of staples spiralling, boreholes drying up or turning brackish from over-use and camps and emergency sites to the south and east reaching maximum capacity, it said.
The battle for Mosul is the largest military operation in Iraq in a decade of turmoil unleashed by the 2003 U.S. invasion which toppled Saddam Hussein.
On Sunday, Iraqi special forces reached the eastern bank of the Tigris in Mosul for the first time since the beginning of the U.S.-backed operation to drive Islamic State militants out of the city that started nearly 12 weeks ago. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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