ACTING HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR HUMAN RIGHTS AND IRAQI HUMAN RIGHTS MINISTER DISCUSS HUMAN RIGHTS IN IRAQ

4 December 2003



The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) has offered to make its expertise available to Iraqi officials and representatives of the country's civil society as they establish a legal framework to promote and protect human rights.

The initiative is one of a series of steps discussed by acting High Commissioner Bertrand Ramcharan and Iraq's Minister of Human Rights, Abdel Baset Turki, during a meeting on 3 December in Geneva. The talks focused on issues of human rights protection in Iraq and on efforts to deal with past violations. Follow-up meetings between Iraqi officials and OHCHR continued through 4 December.

During their meeting, Mr. Turki also briefed the acting High Commissioner on current human rights concerns in Iraq, as well as on efforts to prepare a declaration on human rights for the country, on envisaged constitutional provisions on human rights and on draft rights legislation. He sought the support of OHCHR in a number of areas, including the training of human rights trainers and for the establishment of a human rights resource centre in Baghdad.

The acting High Commissioner undertook to consult the United Nations Office of Legal Affairs on issues regarding proportionality in the use of force by coalition forces in Iraq and compensation for excesses by those forces.

Mr. Ramcharan also offered the expertise of OHCHR and said the Office would arrange a human rights training course urgently in Amman for officials of the human rights ministry. OHCHR was also ready to arrange for some ten persons to travel from Baghdad to Amman, Jordan, to meet with the Special Rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights on the situation in Iraq, Andreas Mavrommatis. Mr. Ramcharan and Mr. Turki expressed readiness to continue and intensify the dialogue.