Wednesday, August 31, 2005

Juan Cole at Informed Comment asks, “Is the US Still Tinkering with the Iraqi Constitution?
And quotes and AP article that says

The U.S. ambassador suggested Tuesday there may be further changes to the draft constitution to win Sunni Arab approval, saying he believed a final edited draft had not been presented.

He also talks about rumors that there are a number of issues still in flux “from Iraq's Arab identity to human rights”. I am always amazed at how well informed [Informed Comment] is.

What I can add to this juicy bit of constitution rumoring is that my little birdy tells me the Shia are trying all their tricks to remove article 44 from the constitution. Now read what article 44 says but you’ve got to promise not to laugh.

Article (44): All individuals have the right to enjoy the rights stated in international human rights agreements and treaties endorsed by Iraq that don't run contrary to the principles and rules of this constitution.

Isn’t this hilarious. Why on earth would they want to make “enjoying the rights stated in international human rights agreements” not a constitutional right?

Habibi, where are you going with this? Who are you people? And where have you taken all the sane secular Iraqis? It’s like Invasion of the Body Snatchers but in turbans.

I was going to say dude, I want my country back but I realized this doesn't really mean anything, which country do I want back? the pre-war oppression frappuccino or the post-war hell-on-earth macchiato ....too confusing. I don't even know what an unflavoured Iraq tastes like.

Better to focus on now.

There are quite a number of reasons why a Shia government would rather not bind itself to human rights treaties. One important reason is not having to deal with the hassle of these human rights contradicting “the undisputed rules of Islam”.
(I am using the AP translation here by the way).