Robson Matt: Debate on Iraq 
Robson Matt: Debate on Iraq 
[Volume:607;Page:4120] 
Hon MATT ROBSON (Deputy Leader—Progressive) 
: 
 The leader of ACT said that New Zealand could not be more irrelevant in this crisis. I would take issue with that. The position that the New Zealand Government has taken in the United Nations and that the Progressive party has been pleased to be part of has made us extremely relevant. Because of our position in the United Nations because we have adhered to international law and because of the fact that the United Nations is the hope for the rule of law for countries large and small we are indeed very very relevant. Enormous pressure has gone on to New Zealand from many quarters to take a different position. There have even been suggestions of great material advantage if New Zealand would take a different position. But the New Zealand Government has stood by international law and by international morality. 
This is of course a troubled time but in such a troubled time Parliaments need to look at facts history and international law. I believe that they also need to listen to the many voices of the people of Iraq itself. No one knows more than the Iraqi people about the disaster of the Saddam Hussein regime. Yet if those voices are listened to one after the other in their great majority we hear them saying that this is not the way to rid Iraq of this monstrous regime. Of course there are those who see the opportunity if there is military action to end the nightmare of the Saddam Hussein regime. But the people of Iraq have I would say a greater sense of history and a greater knowledge than we in this Parliament have demonstrated in many of our speeches because they know that the Saddam Hussein regime was foisted upon them. 
This is not the first time that the people of Iraq have had a regime change. Saddam Hussein is there because of a regime change and when he was given weapons of mass destruction which he did use on his own people—against the Iranian people—there was not a murmur of dissent from many of those and their predecessors who are pushing for this war. When Saddam Hussein set up his fearsome security forces and used them to execute people to put them in jail and to exile them very few voices were raised against that. Yet now his crimes are being brought to light by those who pursue war. 
There is a saying in equity that any litigant must come with clean hands and I would say the people of Iraq fear that they are to be delivered from a brutal regime by those who do not have clean hands. The clean hands in this issue are actually in the United Nations and it is in the United Nations that we must persevere. We must as I said look at facts history and international law. History shows us that tyrants can be brought down. Near to us in Indonesia former President Suharto is no longer in power and the people of East Timor are free. To the east in Chile former President Pinochet a tyrant who had much Western support no longer sits in the presidential palace. If we look at disarmament we see countries that have shown the way. South Africa willingly gave up its weapons of mass destruction. Brazil also gave up its weapons of mass destruction. 
The problem is that many of those who pursue the course of war in Iraq and who point to the weapons of mass destruction that Saddam Hussein has had and that they fear he does have now do not have clean hands themselves on that issue. They have sat by and watched as Israel has developed weapons of mass destruction. They have also sat by and watched as Israel has violated resolution after resolution in the United Nations. They have done nothing about that. So how can the people of Iraq and the people of the Middle East have confidence that we know our history and that we are going to take part in a concerted and long-term effort to make sure that we bring real peace to the Middle East? 
If we look at our history we see that the periods of intervention have been many in the Middle East and that they began with the discovery of oil. And if we know our history we know that unfortunately sometimes New Zealand has lent its support to the seizure of the resources of the people of that region. This war against Saddam Hussein is driven by those deep needs which many people—some perhaps in this Parliament and in the capitals of the world—believe are valid because they are talking about resources that the world needs. But the long-term damage of this war will be enormous because what is being said to the people of Iraq is that we will remove this tyrant and war criminal but we will do it over their bodies. 
The International Criminal Court is another international institution that the New Zealand Government both this present Government and Governments before it can be proud to have supported. I am very hopeful that not only Saddam Hussein but many of the others who have committed crimes against humanity in the Middle East will be brought before that forum. But we should remember that the United States has refused to support the International Criminal Court. One gesture the United States could make to the world and to the people of Iraq now would be to withdraw from this course of war against the people of Iraq and instead to support the International Criminal Court. A second gesture would be to actively support disarmament and the international conventions that are there for disarmament rather than undermining them. That is another step forward—and a very important step—that could and should be taken. 
The United States as the leading country that is proposing this war could also take the step of linking real development with disarmament. Recently the Government of South Africa put before the world a motion to link development with disarmament. It pointed out that in this world billions more are spent on weapons of destruction than on development for the people of the world. That is an extremely sad fact. If we look at what is to happen in Iraq we see the world is mobilising enormous resources—aeroplanes soldiers and war materials. What are they to be used for? They will be used for destruction. However in conference after conference about development the cry goes up for those billions—even a fraction of the billions that are spent on the fearsome weapons held in the hands of the most powerful country in the world—to be directed towards the resources that people need. 
I reiterate that what the New Zealand Government has done is to show a firm grasp of history by knowing that countries small and large need to work through our established international institutions and the rule of law. The New Zealand Government has shown a firm grasp of history by knowing that in the long term this proposal for war is ruinous. But there is an alternative to war and that is to link development with disarmament. We should listen to the voices of those people of Iraq who have suffered so much but who say to us that they do not want this war to solve their problems. They tell us there are other ways of ending the tyranny of the Saddam Hussein regime and that those ways are through development through honesty in international institutions and by giving them real financial help. We should listen to the voices of all those people in the international community who have also taken that course. In particular we should listen to Robin Cook the former Foreign Minister of Great Britain and former Leader of the House of Commons who said: “I have heard it said that Iraq has had not months but 12 years in which to complete disarmament and that our patience is exhausted. Yet it is over 30 years since Resolution 242 called on Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories. We do not express the same impatience with the persistent refusal of Israel to comply.”