Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-11-16-Speech-3-017"
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"en.20051116.3.3-017"2
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".
Mr President, this year, 2005, will go down in history as the year of the freest elections Iraq has ever known. Simply compare this three-day voting period with that country’s experience under the 35 years of the Ba'athist regime, with no elections whatsoever for the first 12 years and mock elections for the rest. What a contrast and what political progress! We do not get to hear anything about this in this House.
To be sure, Mesopotamia’s reconstruction continues to be threatened from within and without, as it was before. That is why the future of a federal Iraq looks very fragile. Earlier this week, a prominent Iraqi politician warned me that this affects Europe in equal measure. Indeed, if the destructive powers win, then our continent will also be in the firing line.
I would ask the Council and Commission what the European Union could do for the Iraqi state and people in this precarious situation. Firstly, we must exert firm pressure on Baghdad’s neighbours so as not to fan the flames of terrorism across the border. Secondly, we must help lay the foundation of democratic rule of law along the banks of the Tigris. ‘We must learn from the Europeans, and we do indeed want to’, said my Iraqi friend, full of optimism. The main thing is that we should not let them down in this aspiration."@en1
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