In October 2019, humanitarian partners reported 50 access incidents across 13 districts. More than 47 per cent of incidents took place within the Governorate of Ninewa. Approximately 63 per cent of reported access incidents constituted administrative restrictions on humanitarian activities and movements in the Governorates of Al-Anbar, Diyala, Dohuk, Kirkuk, Ninewa and Salah al- Din.
Humanitarian operations out of Baghdad were significantly affected when large scale demonstrations began in Baghdad at the beginning of the month, and spread to Al-Sulaymaniyah, Kirkuk, Diyala, Babil and the southern governorates. Intermittent curfews have been imposed in Baghdad and the capitals of southern governorates, resulting in humanitarian activities being restricted in some areas, particularly in Baghdad and Al-Basrah, where only critical UN missions are authorized. Internet outages resulted in delays in the issuance of access letters for humanitarian organizations, which had significant impact on response in Federal Iraqi governorates.
In Diyala governorate, on 7 October, following tribal tensions in Al-Muqdadya district, the security forces imposed a two-day curfew in Diyala, and the Iraqi military began requiring NGOs to use military escorts, which led to temporary suspensions of activities for some organizations.
To improve the accuracy of the representation of access challenges in Iraq, humanitarian organizations are encouraged to report all incident details to OCHA sub-offices.