NEW YORK: United Nations officials on Thursday urged the government of Iraq to push ahead with economic and political reforms and to continue talks with Kuwait about reparations for the disappearance of Kuwaitis during the Iraqi invasion in 1990.
According to Arab News, they also discussed the country’s human rights situation, particularly regarding the rights of Iraqi women. They called on other nations in the region to refrain from violating Iraq’s sovereignty and territory.
During the meeting of the UN Security Council on Iraq, Jeanine Antoinette Plasschaert, the special representative of the UN Secretary-General for Iraq and head of the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq, spoke about the findings of a UN report on the implementation of Resolution 2631. Adopted by the Council in 2022, it states the need to “prioritise the provision of support, advice, and assistance to the government and people of Iraq on advancing the inclusive, political dialogue and national and community-level reconciliation, considering civil society input, with the full, equal and meaningful participation of women.”
Plasschaert said Iraqi officials had made a little progress with reforms but still faced serious economic and political challenges. Noting that the country has, in the previous 20 years, gone through wars and other destabilising events and forces, she said that the factors contributing to its instability still remain essentially the same.
It continues to be the case, she said, that a few of the challenges are related to corruption, the impact of non-state actors, factional politics, unemployment, inequality, and an overreliance on oil.
The fact that the new government was formed in the parliament last October is a “positive” step, Plasschaert said, adding that “Iraq had turned a corner” amid hopes that all factions remain committed to reform and working together.
Pascale Baeriswyl, the Swiss ambassador to the United Nations, whose country holds the rotating presidency of the Security Council this month, urged the government of Iraq to introduce reforms to help fight corruption, improve essential services, save human rights, and also combat climate change.
Khanim Latif, founder, and director of Asuda, the women’s rights organisation in Iraqi Kurdistan, told council members gender-based violence is widespread in Iraq, and those who work to protect and preserve women’s rights are often targeted.
She said, “In current months, we’ve witnessed the campaign against women’s rights defenders in the Kurdistan region of Iraq, simply for using the term ‘gender.’’
The prevalence of violence against women committed by family members and others in the community must be addressed on the country level, she said, with the assistance of the world community, including pressure on Iraqi authorities when required.
There are few Iraqi women in government or other decision-making positions, Latif added, and so the ability to take strick action to secure women’s rights and combat violations against them still remains “highly restricted.”
She said the UN Security Council and the wider world community encouraged the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq to make it part of its mission to monitor the circumstance of women in the country and actively support their rights.
