Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-11-16-Speech-3-013"
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"en.20051116.3.3-013"2
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".
Mr President, Commissioner, I should like to begin by congratulating you and giving you Parliament’s full support for the efforts you are making today so that the European Union carries some weight in the reconstruction of Iraq. Allow me, though, to return to an unsavoury point.
A short time before the start of the war in Iraq, General Morillon put the European Parliament on its guard by saying: ‘there is no such thing as a clean war’. One might have hoped, though, that a war of independence might be less dirty than others. It is no such thing. After the terrible images of the invasion and the scandal of the Abu Ghraib prison, there is now the controversial issue of the white phosphorous bombs allegedly used in the siege of Falluja, a rebel town, but also a martyred town.
Our history taught us that no kind of peace could be built in a country by hiding the atrocities committed there. It is here that an investigation and quest for the truth are required. The formal democracy seeking to establish itself in Iraq and the relations with this country we are seeking to reconstruct come up against the following obvious fact: ‘there can be no democracy without truth’.
Saddam Hussein will be judged for the crimes he committed and, in all likelihood, for using chemical weapons against the Kurds in 1991. That is a simple matter of justice. The truth about the siege of Falluja, about its burned martyrs and about where the responsibility lies regarding the use of weapons banned by the 1980 Geneva Convention are also part of what we must contribute to the Iraqi people in addition to our material aid. We are going to help them to create their justice system: this is what is known as capacity building. Yet, can we really succeed in this undertaking if we do not also make them feel that justice, and especially international justice, exist? I therefore call on you, Mr President, Commissioner, to demand of the coalition forces that a completely independent investigation be carried out and that justice be served.
We have requested in due time that Saddam Hussein be tried by the International Criminal Court. The crime against humanity that the use of chemical weapons in Falluja would constitute, if proven, would fully warrant this move. Yet, if we, in this House, think that all of this is just a pipe dream, then what message of hope can we give today to the Iraqi people?"@en1
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