Iraq – Emergency Tracking - Displacement and returns to Sinjar and Al-Ba’aj districts (8 June - 21 August 2020)

Between 7 and 21 August 2020, DTM tracked 716 individuals (132 families) returning to Sinjar and Al-Ba’aj districts in Iraq’s Ninewa governorate. This brings the total number of individuals that have taken this route to 15,469 (2,850 families) since data collection commenced on 8 June.

Of those individuals who returned between 7 and 21 August, a total of 621 were recorded in Sinjar (87%) and 95 were recorded in Al-Ba’aj (13%) – broadly consistent with the rates of individuals’ districts of arrival since 8 June.

Rates of arrivals have continued to decline in the month of August after peaking in July. Between 7 and 21 August, the average number of individual arrivals was 48 to Sinjar and 7 to Al-Ba’aaj. This is significantly lower than the overall daily average number of individual arrivals to the two districts since 8 June – which are 192 to Sinjar and 20 to Al-Ba’aj.

The most common sub-district of arrival was Al-Shamal with 299 individ- uals (42%), followed by Markaz Sinjar with 228 individuals (32%). Together, these two sub-districts comprise 82% of all individuals recorded as having arrived to Sinjar and Al-Ba’aj since data collection commenced on 8 June. Of those individuals identified as returning between 7 and 21 August, 490 were recorded as returnees (68%), while the remaining 226 were recorded as out-of-camp IDPs (32%). This is consistent with the overall proportion of individuals having been identified as returnees (66%) and IDPs (34%) since 8 June.