Iraqi Consultative Meeting Statement - London 11th June 2014

Iraqi Consultative Meeting Statement - London 11th June 2014

by Iraq Films on 17-06-2014

BRussells Tribunal

We tried to outline our aims for a future that ensures our people’s security, the unity of the country, and the preservation of its ancient civilization and human values.

The photo was taken in June, 11th, 2014, at 16:23 p.m. after the agreement on the principles of the document.

We are a group of Iraqis conscious of our historical diversity of faiths, ethnicities, and schools of thought, met to deliberate our country’s dire present conditions. We tried to outline our aims for a future that ensures our people’s security, the unity of the country, and the preservation of its ancient civilization and human values.

The participants reached some basic conclusions which they adapted as the principles of the Iraqi patriotism and citizenship, as follows;

1. National Independence, Regional and International Relations

We uphold the full independence of Iraq, its territorial integrity, and the basing of its policies and development decisions on the shared interests of its citizens, in conjunction with the good relations with the neighboring countries. We realize that it is necessary to restore the bonds of cooperation between Iraq and its neighbors, through which to emerge from a long period of war and conflict we suffered in the past. We also see that the United Nations Charter, the international treaties and their protocols, are the appropriate approach to the peaceful coexistence among the nations of the region. Non-intervention in the interior affairs of each country by another is one of the most important principles that can assure that.

Regarding the international relations, Iraq should be, as it has always been, open to all the countries around the world, based on fairness, its people’s needs and interests, and without imposition, or guardianship of any kind.

1. Iraq’s Political System

This must be a constitutional democracy, based on political diversity, peaceful transition of power, and equal justice for all citizens under the law. The people are sovereign as the sole source of legality.

The system should be based on:

1. The people’s right to freely choose their representatives in the local and national legislative councils , through periodical elections whose integrity should be guaranteed to prevent coercion or external influences, the Intellectual and political pluralism of the electoral programs should be also guaranteed.
2. Giving all the people equal opportunities to reach the governmental posts and positions based on competence, without reference to ethnicity, sector or regional pertinence.
3. The people have the right to observe and hold government officials accountable for their performance through the official and local, independent associations. Since all citizens are equal before the law, there is no extrajudicial impunity, a power or a privilege for an individual or a group outside the law.
4. All people have the right to demonstrate peacefully, whether to oppose the performance of authorities, or to express their demands through elected, and executive associations.

1. Rights and Freedoms

All citizens have the human rights and freedoms known across the world. These are birth rights and not a grant by anyone; most importantly:

1. Personal safety and security including safety from the disasters which the state should be aware of, and the rights of travel and opinion.
2. Equality of citizens, regardless of the gender, age, ethnicity, religion or ideology; the inadmissibility of enslaving, torturing a person or arresting them arbitrarily; and acknowledging everyone’s freedoms of assembly and expression.
3. The right for every Iraqi, man and woman to freely decide their marriage partner, the right to make a family, to work, to have social insurance in order to keep his / her dignity, and this can be achieved through providing services in housing , health and education.

1. Iraq’s natural resources

All resources on and under the Iraqi soil are fully owned by its people, and belong to them all. We all are responsible for developing and protecting those resources from any inside and outside encroachments, and from waste or confining them to the benefits to a group, ethnicity or a segment of the population.

The distribution of the natural wealth of the country revenue should be guaranteed fairly, to avoid shortages and deprivation, providing equal services among all Iraqis.

1. Woman’s Rights

Women should enjoy their rights as citizens by the national laws, just like the men, and in accordance with the international laws and charters. The role of the woman as a homemaker and the basis to the family and society shouldn’t be an obstacle preventing her to work next to the man to emerge from the abnormal condition currently prevailing in Iraq, These conditions have led to the degradation of women’s rights and affected her dignity. The woman’s rights are the human rights, and ensuring them is a necessary condition of the economic improvement and the social development, to build a future of equality and justice.

1. Rejecting Terrorism and Restoring Civil Peace

Terrorism came to Iraq from abroad; it didn’t exist before the occupation. It’s condemned in all of its aspects, including when it is the government is doing or allowing it. For avoidance of misinterpretation and while recognising the right to resist by the oppressed, the following are acts of terrorism;

1. Any act that might terrorize or intimidate an individual or a group, risking their normal rights in any way.
2. Regular and deliberate use of attacking the peaceful demonstrations and the the safety of residential communities in ways that terrorize people.
3. Any brutal, outrageous act that targets the safety of the community, violently infringing human dignity, and deliberately excluding or marginalizing people, whether the act is carried out by official or unofficial body.

Most terrorism is not a normal result of the conflicts in our society, but an artifact and instrument created  by the local and foreign security forces to serve their purposes. But it grows as to the marginalization, elimination and maltreatment, since it raises the spirit of revenge which can be exploited. That’s why we totally reject all forms of behavior, ideological, and religious extremism, and support the initiatives and mediation efforts to solve civil conflicts peacefully.