"Crisis looms for Iraqi refugees"

"Crisis looms for Iraqi refugees"

Another 1.9 million are displaced within Iraq, many in the past year marked by suicide bombings and sectarian violence.

The appeal came ahead of a two-day international conference in Geneva, opening on Tuesday, called by the United Nations refugee agency to confront massive needs in the region.

"The Middle East is on the verge of a new humanitarian crisis unless the European Union, U.S. and other states take urgent and concrete measures," Amnesty said in a statement.

Malcolm Smart, head of Amnesty International's Middle East and North African Program, said Syria and Jordan had borne the brunt of the refugee exodus so far, "but there must be a limit".

"It is vital that other governments now step in and deliver ... direct assistance to ensure that the refugees are adequately housed and fed, and have access to health care and education in Syria, Jordan and the other (host) countries," he said.

From 40,000 to 50,000 Iraqis flee their homes each month in an exodus linked to pervasive violence, poor basic services, a loss of jobs, and an uncertain future, according to the UNHCR.

Increasingly desperate

More than 3,000 U.S. forces and tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians have been killed since Washington led an invasion of the country in March 2003 that ousted dictator Saddam Hussein.

Sectarian tensions between majority Shi'ites and long dominant Sunni Arabs erupted after the bombing of a Shi'ite shrine in Samarra in February 2006, adding to widespread insurgency violence and prompting many to leave their homes.

"Those who have fled are becoming increasingly desperate as they and their host communities run out of resources," UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond told reporters before the Geneva meeting.

"We hope to hear commitments on all of these aspects next week because the international community needs to focus collectively on a whole range of humanitarian needs," he said.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari, U.N. Emergency Relief Coordinator John Holmes, U.S. Under-Secretary of State Paula Dobriansky and senior European officials are among 450 officials due to attend.

Although the gathering is not a donor conference, U.N. officials hope that it will put pressure on Western states to provide more financial help and take more Iraqi asylum-seekers. Amnesty urged the United States and EU member states to set up "generous settlement programs" to take in the most vulnerable Iraqi refugees, often in need of costly medical care.

"Such resettlement programs should go far beyond token numbers and should constitute a significant part of the solution to the current crisis," it said.

Several thousand Iraqi refugees were accepted by so-called third countries last year, according to UNHCR, which hopes to find 20,000 resettlement places this year.