Mission Report, Iraq 2003

At the invitation of the UN and the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), an ILAC mission visited Iraq 12-20 August, 2003, funded by the British Government. The team's project proposals were made part of the proposal for judicial reconstruction, put forward by the Iraqi Governing Council and the CPA at the international donors conference for Iraq in Madrid in October, 2003.

Introduction

This report is the result of an ILAC mission to Iraq 13 – 20 August 2003. The mission was undertaken in cooperation with the United Nations and its Special Representative to Iraq Sergio Vieira de Mello as well as with the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA).
This mission would not have taken place without the support and cooperation of Sergio de Mello, who had earlier invited ILAC to conduct a similar mission in East Timor in December of 2001. The ILAC mission to Iraq met with Sergio de Mello in his office only two days before his tragic death in the bomb attack on the UN headquarters in Baghdad in the afternoon of Tuesday 19 August. As usual, he demonstrated his keen interest and deep knowledge of issues of human rights and the rule of law. The proposals at the end of this report have been approved by him. Sergio de Mello can not be replaced, but the horrific killings of him and several members of his staff must strengthen the resolve to help bring the rule of law to the people of Iraq.

1.1. Scope of the mission
Prior to the ILAC Mission, an extensive country-wide assessment of the post-war judicial system in Iraq had been carried out under the auspices of CPA and the Overseas Prosecutorial Development and Training Office of the United States Department of Justice (OPDAT). The conclusion from that assessment, both by the UN and CPA, has been that the existing judicial system is largely acceptable as a platform to build from, but there are obvious strong needs for resources and training. Therefore, after consultations with UN and CPA, the scope of the ILAC mission has been limited to identifying and defining specific projects for the reconstruction of the judicial system - on the basis of the CPA assessment report and interviews with Iraqi judicial officials and legal organisations as well as with the UN and CPA - and in concert with other initiatives. For a list of our meetings, see Appendix A. However, since most readers of this report will not have had access to the OPDAT assessment, this report also includes a brief description of the Iraqi judicial system and its different actors.