BBC: The Iraq conflict has wreaked "terrible damage" on the region - far more than has been acknowledged, the Archbishop of Canterbury has said.
Dr Rowan Williams said "urgent attention" was needed to stabilise the country. His comments followed a visit to Syria to meet Iraqi refugees.
He said talking to the refugees had been "heartbreaking and harrowing".
A survey published in September 2007 suggested that up to 1.2m people might have died because of the Iraq conflict.
'Liberty and dignity'
Speaking following his visit, Dr Williams said: "The events of the last few years have done terrible damage in the whole of this region and many people, I know, do not see the cost in human terms of the war which was unleashed.
"Security that will enable these people to return to Iraq depends on a settlement for the whole of that country guaranteeing the liberty and dignity of every minority."
About half a million refugees have fled Iraq for Syria since the conflict began in 2003.
Dr Williams said many of the people he had met told him they left the war-torn country because their families had been kidnapped, executed or told they would be killed unless they paid ransoms.
The archbishop added that the refugees had told him their circumstances were desperate and unsustainable, with no hope either of a safe return to Iraq or of citizenship in Syria or elsewhere. [Source BBC: Archbishop speaks of Iraq damage]
Mark Alexander
