BAGHDAD, Feb. 3 (Xinhua) -- Iraq's President Barham Salih on Sunday called for clearing unexploded landmines and explosives from areas liberated from Islamic State (IS) militants in Iraq.
During a meeting with Peter Maurer, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), at the presidential palace in Baghdad, Salih asserted the importance of boosting humanitarian work and extending a hand of help to Internally Displaced People (IDPs) and to provide them with psychological treatment and health care, a statement from the Iraqi Presidency Media Office said.
During the meeting, Salih also praised the efforts of ICRC and other aid organizations operating in Iraq for providing people affected by violence with humanitarian and medical aid.
For his part, Maurer demonstrated the efforts of ICRC and its work in Iraq, especially in the field of tracing and finding missing people.
IS militants have planted thousands of landmines in areas they once seized, and despite the efforts of Iraq's security forces, some liberated areas still require expertise to clear the landmines in order to become safe for their inhabitants to return.
According to the Iraqi Ministry of Migration and Displacement, some 5 million Iraqis have been displaced from urban areas since the extremist IS group took control of large swathes in the provinces of Anbar, Salahudin, Kirkuk and Diyala in 2014.
On Dec. 9, 2017, Iraq officially declared full liberation from IS militants after Iraqi forces recaptured all the areas once seized by the extremist group.