Media

Baroness Nicholson MEP Backs European Parliament Iraq Report

12 March 2008

Baroness Nicholson MEP who chairs the European Parliament’s Permanent ad hoc Delegation for relations with Iraq and was also the first foreign speaker to address the Iraqi Parliament in October 2007 today gave her backing to the European Parliament’s recommendations to the Council on the European Union’s role in Iraq.

Speaking during the debate Baroness Nicholson stated:

“Iraq today has a true parliament and a wholly secular constitution. Iraq is one of the very few nations in this region to have a democracy – a secular democracy – despite its flaws. We therefore must do all we can to help the Iraqis strengthen the democratic process. I believe strengthening ties between our respective parliaments is one of the key ways in which we can assist.”

The European Parliament’s recommendations call on the EU to out in place a “new strategy… [to] support UN efforts to help build a safe, stable, unified, prosperous, federal and democratic Iraq that upholds human rights, protects its minorities and promotes inter-ethnic tolerance so as to pave the way towards regional stability and security”.

The report also calls on EU’s support for democratic governance to be put towards three goals in particular:

• enhancing coordination between the Government and the Council of Representatives of Iraq in order to minimise blockages in the legislative process;
• strengthening electoral procedures at the local level in order to ensure that provincial councils are fully representative of all local populations; and
• reinforcing local democracy with consultative mechanisms to draw the local people into the decision-making process on a regular and frequent basis;

Furthermore the report urges the EU to give “technical assistance and capacity-building in the fields of the rule of law, justice, human rights, good governance, financial and budget management, gender equality, health and education, and on the strengthening of federal, regional and local government institutions”.

Concluding her comments during the debate, Baroness Nicholson MEP said:

“The people of Iraq demand democracy and have a right to good governance. They also demand and need the provision of basic human rights, of essential public services and the full complement of those privileges that we have in our democracies in Western Europe. I would suggest that the price of a stable Iraq exerting a benign influence regionally and nationally is worth every effort to attain.”

END