ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Schools set up for displaced Iraqis are being closed and teachers recalled by Baghdad, forcing families to choose between returning to their areas or attending non-governmental schools in camps.

"[If they close the schools] the future of my children will be lost. I will have to take them to the NGO school. If I could get a job (back home) I would go back and have them schooled back in Tal Afar. That would be OK," Nadhir Mustafa, an IDP told AP.

Public school in Iraq begins in September. In Erbil alone, Iraq's education ministry aims to close 70 percent of schools, according to the AP.

"Definitely that would have a negative effect. It would be a disaster for the children. It would produce an illiterate generation that would cause us lots of problems in the future. If a child doesn't get education he will be exposed to all kinds of bad influences, you know," said Najim Abdullah, a parent.

Abdulmujib Naif, the Iraqi education ministry's representative in Erbil, confirmed the closures, and revealed teachers who are recalled will have to prove they cannot return.

"There is a decision by the ministry to keep the representative office in the Kurdistan Region but all the state employees (teachers) must go back to their home areas, while the areas that are still not secure or have no health services, or the people whose house has been destroyed, those people can stay if they can prove this," he said.

Camp managers have told Rudaw of 100s of families experiencing secondary displacement, for example, leaving a camp for West Mosul or Anbar, only to discover they prefer the safety and services in camps in the Kurdistan Region.

Throughout the country 1,953,984 Iraqis remain displaced, according to the IOM. The KRG's Joint Crisis Coordination Center reports that it shelters 1,383,706 individuals, including IDPs and mostly Syrian refugees.

Most displaced Iraqis are Sunni — returning home now means they are in Shiite-controlled areas, where mistrust runs deep and Sunnis feel increasingly disenfranchised in Iraq's social and political climate.

Security remains a concern, as well. The UN estimated on Monday that some 20,000-30,000 ISIS members remain in Iraq and Syria, primarily in the border areas which Anbar and Nineveh are a part of.

Rudaw