en.aleteia.org, Sylvain Dorient, 2017-03-15
The Logelis company delivered prefabricated houses, thus opening up new horizons for Christian refugees in Kurdistan, Iraq.
Since the attack by the Islamic State group, 1.5 million Iraqi refugees have fled their homes, 25% of them without permanent accommodation. According to information from the city of Mosul, if the areas in which they previously lived are liberated in the future, the devastation of these areas will slow them down or even discourage them. Vincent Gelot, responsible for the Orient in Iraq, wonders: “They hope to return home, but look at the rubble of Sinjar (a town a hundred kilometers from Mosul), recovered in November 2015) destroyed during the war, how can they return home under these conditions? Where will they be? »
Mobile homes
Hence the idea of collaborating with Logelis, a French company founded by Mr. Renaud Sassi, specializing in the construction of mobile homes. In 2016, the company built a mobile church for refugees. The recent contract provides for the construction of 69 houses with an area of 35, 40 or 65 square meters in the city of Erbil.
Iraqi women paint their house
Iraqi women were invited to paint their house. The panels are made of
Roman-sur-Isère, in Drôme before delivery in the next three weeks to Erbil, where they are assembled on site by trained workers. Mr. Renaud Sassi explains: “We recommend iron frame, carpentry, door and window workshops. Our design allows for well-insulated structures not typically found in Iraq, where everything is built of bricks! While the temperature difference is from +50 degrees Celsius to minus 10 degrees Celsius!”
From Drôme to Erbil in three weeks
Erbil is not necessarily the terminal for these mobile homes, explains Vincent Gelot: “With this house, the refugees know that they have accommodation for them. They can stay or go with this house. They can bring this house back to their old house, where everything was destroyed. Once erected, these houses can be transported, either left alone or split in half and loaded by truck.
Objective: 6000 houses
Mobile home solutions open up horizons for refugees. But these houses can also be used for other purposes, such as reconstruction and peacemaking. Recently, many houses have been delivered to Karamlech to be lived in by deminers who clear the occupied areas and to clean up landmines left behind by Islamic State forces.
According to this plan, the Oriental Society in Iraq and the Logelis company will build 6,000 houses for the refugees. A partnership with workers can assemble houses in Iraq to manufacture and erect the panels…
“A relationship of trust already exists with the Iraqi refugees, being French, we are very well received”, declared Mr. Renaud Sassi. It is a question of permanently maintaining the presence of Christians here!