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Baroness Cox: My Lords, we all owe a debt of gratitude to my noble friend Lord Hylton for securing this debate on a subject which has been seriously neglected.

For various minority groups, including the Christians of various traditions, the situation is extremely grave and I will be echoing and endorsing all those concerns expressed by previous speakers. As has been said, there has been a Christian presence in Iraq since the first century. The country's Christians now comprise about 3 per cent of the Iraqi population, about 85 per cent of whom belong to the Assyrian tradition. They face severe pressures and are under such threat that their very survival is at risk. They face danger daily. Many have already been killed, kidnapped or subjected to such intimidation that they have fled the country to exile in Jordan, Syria or further afield.

The first co-ordinated attacks against churches occurred in August 2004. Further attacks have followed. Many of the attacks involve physical
 
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violence in which Christians have been killed and others intimidated, for example, with letters warning, "You are not wanted here".

Christians have been targeted for various reasons, and partly because they suffer a double stigma. On the one hand, they were seen as favoured protégés of Saddam, who needed their knowledge and skills. On the other, they are now seen as guilty of association with the coalition forces and thus defined by militant Muslims as "modern-day crusaders". Also many Iraqi Christians were educated at Christian schools, where they learnt languages needed for work as translators for the coalition forces.

These characteristics legitimise, for some, the killing of Christians and attacks on Christian property. Christians are also vulnerable because they do not belong to large tribes and have relativity little familial protection.

Widespread kidnapping is another major problem. Christians are particularly vulnerable here because of their faith and also because they are deemed to be sufficiently wealthy to pay the ransom and to have access to western sources for funds for paying for their freedom. In some cases, a victim was killed if his family had difficulty raising the necessary money. Therefore some Church leaders are afraid to travel to visit their communities for fear of kidnapping.

Another very serious problem confronts the Christian community: the fear that the proposed constitution will not allow freedom of worship. Despite assurances by the Transitional National Assembly that the rights of minorities will be protected, proposals to combine Sharia with the so-called "best of the west" in democracy and protection of the rights of minorities are untenable. By its nature, Islamic Sharia law violates fundamental rights and freedoms enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights—such as the principle of equality before the law and freedom to choose and change religion.

As it has been applied over the centuries, Sharia does not allow equality before the law between men and women or between Muslims and non-Muslims. Moreover, while Sharia allows freedom to choose to become a Muslim, that is a one-way street. The decision to convert from Islam is apostasy, punishable by death—dictated by Sharia court, the family or local community. Therefore, Sharia law would have further devastating effects on the rights and freedoms of Christian and other non-Muslim communities in Iraq. One needs only to consider the situation in places such as northern Nigeria, where I was last week, or Pakistan, to understand how serious would be the effects of Iraq adopting a Sharia-based constitution.

Last year, I happened to be speaking at an inter-faith conference, where I voiced my concerns about Sharia. I was the first speaker to raise that potentially sensitive subject and I did so with trepidation, worried lest I should offend Muslims present, especially a sizeable group of devout Muslim women from Iraq. After my presentation, I went up to them to apologise in case I had upset them. Their response was unequivocal and enthusiastic: to my surprise, they said that before I spoke, they had begun to think they were
 
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wasting their time coming to the conference. They said that they were grateful to me, because I was the only speaker to raise the issues that really mattered to them, including the question of Sharia law. They then added emphatically, to my great surprise, "We hate Sharia".

Such passionate feelings about Sharia and its implications for the rights of women have been echoed by other Muslim women—the famous writer, Irshad Manji and the Dutch Member of Parliament, Hirsan Ali. I therefore very much hope that not only Christians' anxieties about Sharia law will be taken into account but those of other Iraqi citizens, especially women.

I therefore ask whether the Government will demonstrate a much stronger commitment to the fundamental rights of minorities, including the Christian communities, by putting more pressure on the Iraqi authorities to provide systematic protection for all minorities, so that all can live, work and worship in peace and safety. Will the Government undertake to put pressure on the Iraqi authorities to resist any form of Sharia law, which would inevitably curtail the rights of non-Muslims and of women, as well as denying the fundamental freedom to choose and change religion?

The Christians and other minorities in Iraq feel severely let down by the international community—primarily, perhaps, by the United Kingdom and the United States. It is essential that Britain and America act, and act quickly, to protect the Christians and other vulnerable minorities. We have a particular responsibility to do so, because the present situation is a direct result of American and British intervention. We must therefore accept responsibility and do much more to reverse the spiral of violence in which minorities feel increasingly vulnerable.

Unless Britain and America take appropriate action, we will be responsible for a situation which may deteriorate to such an extent that Iraq will join the tragic catalogue of countries in that part of the world where the rights of minorities, including Christians, are not respected or protected and they are left so vulnerable that their communities wither on the vine and their people emigrate, leaving a land bereft of the priceless traditions of cultural diversity and religious tolerance. That would be a tragic outcome and a betrayal of the principles for which the United States and United Kingdom went to war and continue to engage.

Religious freedom and the rights of all minorities must be the touchstone of success or failure of that engagement.

8.14 pm

Baroness Northover: My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, for bringing this matter to the attention of the House today and for introducing it so effectively. His passion was echoed by the noble Lord, Lord Rea, the right reverend Prelate, and the noble Baroness, Lady Cox. The complexity of Iraq was something of which experts warned before the Allies went in. The resonance of the names we have before us—names that go back to medieval history and
 
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far beyond—should not conceal the fact that the people about whom we are talking are not distant; they are real and vulnerable, especially as power struggles ensue in Iraq and the political map changes.

We have a responsibility here, because we helped to set those power struggles in motion. The removal of Saddam, welcome as that was, was bound, as was warned, to open up a series of complex problems. Some of those who were themselves oppressed under Saddam are all the more keen never to let that happen again to their group. Whether they are as protective of others is another matter.

The precise influence that the British Government have may well be limited. Even in the period when the UK was, in coalition with the US, supposedly running the Coalition Provision Authority, we all know how that was dominated by the US to the exclusion of the UK. But valiant efforts were made by the Allies to ensure that the make-up of temporary bodies was balanced between the various ethnic and religious groups. We know how concerned the Allies were about the engagement of the Sunnis. We also know how concerned they were to ensure that women were fully included in the process and how difficult that proved to be.

All the time that we are actively involved in Iraq, pressure should be brought to bear on those drawing up the new Iraqi constitution, emphasising that peace and stability is likely to result only if all groups are drawn into the process and feel that they are being treated fairly. The position of the Chaldo-Assyrians, the Turkomen and other minorities is clearly a cause for serious concern.

The Iraqi constitution is supposed to be drafted by 15 August. The new system will surely need to be federal, democratic and pluralistic. Most Iraqis seem to agree that a federal structure that assigns certain powers, such as defence and foreign affairs, to central government, should be balanced with the decentralising of other powers to regional and local authorities. The control of oil may need to be assigned to central rather than local government; that is one way of preventing the peeling-off of Iraqi Kurdistan, with the knock-on effects that that would have on Iraq as a whole, minority groups in Iraqi Kurdistan and surrounding countries.

Does the noble Baroness think that if Iraq is divided into federal areas those should be geographical rather than ethnic, in fact to protect minority groups, despite the appeal that divisions might seem to present? Alternatively, is she persuaded that there should be enclaves for some groups, as is suggested by some noble Lords? Guaranteeing minority rights across Iraq is surely the key to stability and progress. Does the noble Baroness anticipate that the Iraqi constitution will include a Bill of individual rights and measures to protect and promote minority group rights? Does she see Islam as the official religion? If so, in what form might that be, as the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, asked, and how far might it run right through society?
 
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There are strong signs that the rights of minorities are not being respected now. Does the noble Baroness accept, for example, that certain Chaldo-Assyrian groups were not given ballot papers in the January elections? What conclusion has the Electoral Commission come to on that, and what difference might that have made?

I was glad to read the statement of the President of the Kurdistan region, Mr Barzani, that,

"Turkomen and Chaldo-Assyrians are our respected brothers and sisters, and we will do whatever is within our capability and authority for the sake of their well-being . . . We consider ourselves their advocates and defenders of their rights".

I realise that that may be greeted with some scepticism, but I would prefer to regard it as a genuine pledge, publicly made, which must of course be genuinely observed.

The Kurdistan Regional Office declares that the independent Electoral Commission did not deliver sufficient ballot papers to some regions of Iraq. Does the noble Baroness accept its explanation that Kurds lost out here, too, or does she take the contrary view, which is that the Christian community lost out disproportionately? If so, what recompense might there be? When will the Electoral Commission report on that matter?

Over the centuries, as we have heard, the Christian community in Iraq has dwindled. Now, besides the political power struggle taking place there, the Christians are also being targeted by Islamic extremists. Tens of thousands have now fled Iraq. Women have had acid thrown on their faces for not wearing the veil. Amnesty reports assassinations of Chaldo-Assyrians at the hands of both Kurds and Islamic extremists. On a more mundane level, in some areas, reconstruction money seems not to have gone to the Chaldo-Assyrian community although it has gone to the Kurdish community in the same area. Will the noble Baroness comment on that?

I want to refer briefly to another disadvantaged group, the Turkomen. What progress is being made to assess the property rights of those displaced people? What is being done to ensure that there is a fair system of restoring land and property taken from the Turkomen during Saddam's Arabisation programme? The Iraqi Property Claims Commission has that as its task. How is it progressing? Has it handed back a single property? At the moment there are tens of thousands of dispossessed former residents in camps outside the city of Kirkuk.

Iraq remains in a very volatile state. In such circumstances it is not surprising if different groups do their best to secure for themselves a firm foothold on power. Groups that have been oppressed in Iraq and now find themselves in the ascendancy might well remember what it felt like to be oppressed. We must put all the pressure we can on all sides to act with tolerance and inclusiveness in drawing up plans for the future of Iraq. Only then, surely, will it be well placed to become a secure and peaceful state without tectonic plates moving beneath the surface, which threaten to break up and destroy the country and once more imprison its people, and threaten the region as a whole.
 
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8.22 pm

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