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UN pleads with sides in Mosul to spare civilians

The UN refugee agency has called on warring parties in Iraq to spare the lives of civilians and not to use them as hostages or human shields amid a wide-scale military operation to dislodge Islamic State militants from the northern city of Mosul.

 

Speaking to reporters in Baghdad, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi, says he raised the issue of protection civilians with the Iraqi government and received "strongest assurances" from Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi.

 

Grandi underlined that protection civilians "will indispensable for the future of Iraq, for the future in which the people of Iraq have live together and build a prosperous country."

 

The comments came hours after the government of Iraq announced the start of the long-awaited Mosul operation.

 

 


פרסום ראשון: 10.17.16, 16:08