Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-09-15-Speech-3-056"
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"en.20040915.2.3-056"2
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"Mr President, the civil war in Iraq has inevitably meant that in recent months the media have focused almost exclusively on security. However, behind the headlines there is another agenda already in operation, and that is where the European Union should be involved. This is an absolute priority: the building of a peaceful society.
Capacity–building, the fight against corruption, strengthening the fight against organised crime and bringing in human rights and the rule of law – these words are familiar to us. They are weapons of dialogue that we use every day of the week in turning post–Communist states into Member States of the European Union or wider Europe neighbours, away from totalitarianism and tyranny and towards democracy.
Iraq is in just that condition today. The Iraqis are just like us: they share the same desire for freedom and for a settled society. Beneath the veil, behind the tribal dress, beyond the cultural differences of East and West, Iraq and Iraqis have the same high hopes of the essential freedoms and the rule of law that we Europeans and Americans enjoy. They look to us to help institute those freedoms and the fundamental freedom of human rights. The European Union should focus now on building that agenda with Iraq. It is a possibility. It is happening now, away from the guns, bombs and rockets, and that is what we should be involved in.
I ask you to remember that under Saddam Hussein Iraqis had no such freedoms, no access to human rights. That is the reason why, even now, today, with bombs and rockets, with the difficulties of security, the majority of Iraqis prefer to be without the previous regime and in the situation they are in now. We should help Iraq build a peaceful society."@en1
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