Iraq learning maps, prepared 17 October 2026

Scope: nineteen governorates, twenty curated city points and six river/lake
features. These are generalised learning maps. They do not resolve disputed
territories, show current security control, or describe present water levels.
Codes beginning iq- are application identifiers, not claims about ISO codes.

Governorates: geoBoundaries gbOpen IRQ ADM1 simplified geometry (18 areas),
https://github.com/wmgeolab/geoBoundaries/tree/main/releaseData/gbOpen/IRQ/ADM1
https://www.geoboundaries.org/
geoBoundaries attribution: Runfola et al. (2020), geoBoundaries: A global database
of political administrative boundaries. PLOS ONE 15(4): e0231866.
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0231866
Underlying ADM1 geometry is CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication,
according to the geoBoundaries source metadata (2022 boundary, 2023 build).
https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/

Halabja: OpenStreetMap relation 3826029, retrieved 17 October 2026 through
https://polygons.openstreetmap.fr/get_geojson.py?id=3826029&params=0
https://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/3826029
© OpenStreetMap contributors, Open Database Licence 1.0.
https://www.openstreetmap.org/copyright
https://opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/1-0/
The Halabja shape is intersected with the source Sulaymaniyah polygon, then
subtracted from Sulaymaniyah to avoid overlap. Generalised at 0.001 degrees.
Polygon topology is normalised with Turf and GEOS, then snapped at one
millionth of a degree. Sulaymaniyah is differenced against the final Halabja
outline to preserve a shared edge without overlap. The resulting
governorate database is distributed under ODbL 1.0, with underlying source
attribution retained. It is not a legal boundary or territorial-control map.

Halabja's federal recognition in 2025 is independently documented at
https://www.mfa.gov.cn/eng/xw/zwbd/202508/t20250829_11698237.html
and the EUAA Iraq country guidance. The data does not treat Halabja as part of
Sulaymaniyah simply because an older ADM1 dataset contains only eighteen areas.

Rivers and lakes: Natural Earth 1:10m rivers/lake centerlines and lakes, public
domain, retrieved 17 October 2026 from
https://github.com/nvkelso/natural-earth-vector/blob/master/geojson/ne_10m_rivers_lake_centerlines.geojson
https://github.com/nvkelso/natural-earth-vector/blob/master/geojson/ne_10m_lakes.geojson
https://www.naturalearthdata.com/about/terms-of-use/
Tigris, Euphrates and Shatt al Arab lines are split at the country outline and
interior segments retained. Lakes: Tharthar, Habbaniyah and Razazah (Milh).
Reference outlines can substantially exceed current water coverage.

Cities and sight pins: curated WGS84 longitude, latitude. Broad landscapes and
historic quarters use representative pins, explicitly described in the guide.
They are not guaranteed visitor entrances or navigation instructions.

Reproduction: scripts/iraq-map-source.geojson retains the normalised geometry;
public/data/iraq-map-places.json retains place names, prompts and explanations.
Run node scripts/build-iraq-maps.mjs to reproduce the three served GeoJSON files,
the atlas pack and its place-name registry. Verify with
node scripts/test-iraq-guide.cjs.