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Iraq War
March 26, 2003 12:00 AM
By Sarah Ludford MEP in European Parliament
By Sarah Ludford MEP in European Parliament
If EU leaders were actually to deliver the goals set last week of the central role of the UN, an EU capacity in foreign and defence policy and strengthening the transatlantic partnership, most of the public would cheer.
Our leaders are letting us down. One of the few silver linings of this illegitimate war is that even in the UK more people realise how crucial it is to have a single European voice.
Chirac should realise that making the EU a rival of the US is a no-brainer. Blair needs to understand that the route to partnership with Washington is via Brussels. On Iraq, what was missing from the Summit conclusions was a reference to preserving the devolved administration of the Kurds in the north. The Kurds have been betrayed so often, but this time we must guarantee their freedom and identity. They must enjoy self-government within a federal democratic Iraq.
I absolutely agree that Iraq must observe the Geneva Conventions on prisoners of war, but how hypocritical it is for Rumsfeld to insist on this while denying such protection to those prisoners illegally detained in Guantanamo Bay.
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