Idea !

Bit of an afternoon surf today, and noticed discussion sort of hovering around constitution readings, contractors, troops, and the usual indiscriminate shootings, bombings and arrests ~ in no especial order but it reminded me of a thought from a while ago...

It could be written into the constitution to hold "visitors" (all embracing definition including contractors, troops etc) in Iraq accountable to human rights laws, while in Iraq. At the moment the constitution just seems to cover Iraqis in Iraq, but there are lots of others in Iraq as well.

Of course, it would have to be written very carefully. And it would be unprecedented - no other constitution in the world that I know of has anything like it, so whoever might choose to write something like that into Iraq's constitution would really be breaking new ground and "leading the way".

A nice way to do it, might be to include a reference to other people's constitutional roots - something about all people in Iraq of all nationalities being accountable to the international bill of human rights maybe?

Theoretically, people are supposed to be accountable to their own constitutions when abroad but that's not always the way it works out and a sort of international interlinking constitutional reference might help remind people to be humane. In writing an article like that it might be an idea to write it more along universal declaration of human rights lines rather then invoke individual country's constitutions - partly because the constitutions of some countries with people in Iraq are in flux themselves, at this point.

Not a bad idea really, when you think about how many different people there are in Iraq (and how many borders Iraq has).

Crazy idea? Maybe, but can anyone think of any reason why this shouldn't or couldn't be included.

Will hold off writing thoughts about the rest of the constitution (unless anyone really wants to know in which case I could be persuaded and you might regret it) anyway will hold off for the minute, if only because I'd just be echoing what others have already noted: hastily written, full of loopholes, Iraq already had one - five in fact. Could say more, won't right now.

* A link to an article published in the July 1948 issue of the United Nations Bulletin, found the article itself a bit dry but interesting from historic point of view. Written by Charles Malik.