Iraqi women and the right to self-determination
By Minnie Bruce Pratt


As fierce resistance to the U.S. occupation of Iraq continues, both the Bush administration and liberal Democrats continue to use the excuse of “democracy” to justify invasion, the murder of tens of thousands of Iraqis and installation of a puppet government.

Now it appears that progressive laws which had guaranteed women’s rights for decades may be wiped out of Iraq’s new draft constitution as a direct result of U.S. violation of Iraqi sovereignty. The progressive laws, instituted after the Iraqis overthrew British colonialism in 1958, granted women the right to choose their own husbands and to have divorce cases heard by a judge, among other freedoms.