Oct 12, 2008

UNPO Calls for Return of Article 50


 

UNPO has issued an urgent call for the decision by some legislators to drop Article 50 from the Iraqi Provincial Law to be reversed and has appealed to the European Union, United Nations, and national governments to support this call and step up their own criticism of this damaging development.  


 

 
Below is a statement by UNPO General Secretary, Mr. Marino Busdachin: 

On 24 September 2008, Iraq’s Council of Representatives voted to eliminate Article 50 of the Provincial Law - an article that had passed into legislation only two months earlier, on 22 July 2008. 

Article 50 would have reserved a total of fifteen seats in provincial councils for ethnic and religious communities such as the Assyrians, Mandaeans, Shabaks, Turkmen, and Yezidis, all of whom are groups that form an important, but threatened, part of Iraq’s rich cultural mosaic. 

The removal of these reserved seats will severely weaken the representation of these groups at the provincial level in Iraq.  It will also be a set back for Iraq’s ambition to develop a pluralistic, tolerant, and democratic society. 

Iraq’s minorities have shared the suffering with the other groups in Iraq during the years of the dictatorship and have sought to be active participants in the democratic process of the new Iraq.  The decision to remove Article 50 will limit this unnecessarily. 

UNPO therefore calls on the government and the Council of Representatives of Iraq to reinstate Article 50 as soon as possible and urges the United Nations, European Union, and United States of America to support Article 50 and its aims.

 

To read this statement in pdf format please click here.