TEHRAN -- The spokesman of the office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Iran, Mohammad Nouri, said here Sunday that over 30,000 Iraqi refugees are currently settled in Iraq's southern Province of Wasit, which borders Iran.

"Iraqi refugees from Baghdad and Nassiriya are still in Iraqi soil but have already settled in Badra city," Nouri told IRNA.

Badra is a city in Wasit Province, 15km off the Iranian border town of Mehran.

The refugees came to the border regions by bus or car with no personal belongings.

It seems the refugees are not willing to leave Iraq and enter Iran. They are determined to return to their cities once peace is restored in their country, he said.

A number of Iraqi refugees, who had settled in Iraqi border areas, have already returned to their cities after learning of the fall of Baghdad.

No Iraqi refugee has so far entered Iranian territory via its border with Iraq in this western province, it was announced on Sunday.

Ali Zeynivandi, a senior official at the provincial governor general's office, told that the Islamic Republic of Iran's policy is to prevent refugees from entering Iranian territory and for this reason has built refugee camps inside Iraqi territory near the common border.

Iraqi refugees were to be accommodated in those camps and prevented from entering Iran, he added.

Iraqi refugees who have reached the Iranian border in the past few days after the overthrow of the Saddam regime are not insisting on entering Iran, he said.

Over 10,000 Iraqi refugees are currently staying in camps near the Iranian border each day requesting food, medicine and other essentials, he said, adding that some of them have requested to meet their relatives residing in Iran.

The Islamic Republic has started giving relief aid to the Iraqi refugees and displaced people since Wednesday, the official added, saying several tons of bread, canned goods, ice, medicines and other essential requirements have been dispatched to the Iranian border for the Iraqi refugees.

Iran has set up two camps at the border cities of Mehran and Dehloran to accommodate 50,000 and 25,000 refugees, respectively.

Iran's longest stretch of common borders (430km) with Iraq is in the western province of Ilam, which borders the Iraqi provinces of Wasit and Nissan.

Iran closed its western borders with Iraq just before the outbreak of the U.S.-led invasion in order to prevent a fresh influx of refugees into the country which has already accommodated more than 200,000 Iraqis since the first Persian Gulf War in 1991.

Some 1.3 million Iraqi refugees flooded the Iranian borders during the 1991 Persian Gulf War. Officials have predicted that a protracted war could unleash another flood of between 500,000 and 1.2 million refugees to Iran.

To soften its "closed door" policy, Tehran built refugee camps on the "no man's land" near the border with Iraq.

The Head of the Interior Ministry's Headquarters for the Iraq Crisis, Ahmad Hosseini, said that Iran has spent some 11 million dollars to build those refugee camps.

But, he said, Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has contributed thus far only one million dollars to Iran for the facilities it has constructed for this year's Persian Gulf war refugees.

Iran estimated it needed some 16 million dollars to establish, equip and provide necessary facilities for the current refugees, he said, but unfortunately international agencies have not responded sufficiently, he lamented.

Hosseini said Iran has built 10 camps on its border with Iraq capable of accommodating 400,000 refugees.