New Iraqi constitution to be based on Islamic tenets

The new Iraqi constitution should be based on Islamic tenets with restrictions on women's rights on issues such as marriage, divorce and inheritance laws, members of a committee drafting the document declared yesterday.

Shia members of the drafting committee have started a drive to make the new constitution less secular, insisting that is the wish of the majority of the electorate who voted Shia-dominated and religion-based parties into power in the elections.

Mariam al-Rayyes, a Shia member of the committee, said Islam will be a "main source" for legislation in the new constitution and the state religion.

"It gives women all rights and freedoms as long as they don't contradict with our values," she said.

"Concerning marriage, inheritance and divorce, this is civil status laws; that should not contradict with religious values."

Her comments are seen as the first salvo in the battle over the draft constitution which is yet to be approved.

Al-Rayyes said committee members have decided that over the next two four-year parliamentary terms, women will make up at least 25 per cent of the membership.

After two terms, women will be allowed to get as many seats as they win in elections, without a minimum percentage.

Al-Rayyes said there has also been an agreement on matters of women in parliament and civil law, but some members have some reservations Efforts to roll back women's rights during the US occupation were shelved under pressure from women's groups and others. However, advocates of a greater role for Islamic law are pushing for a text that could disadvantage women.

Under Islamic law, for example, a woman gets half of what a man would get when it comes to inheritance. Men also have the power when it comes to initiating divorces.

Iraq has been operating under a secular 1959 civil status law that treated every person according to the sect to which he belongs. This law will still be in effect after the new constitution is drafted.

"We reject the changes prepared on the 1959 law because some Islamic parties want to kidnap the rights of women in Iraq," said Yanar Mohammed, women's rights activist and head of the Women's Freedom in Iraq Movement.

"We reject such attempts because women should be full citizens with full rights, not a semi-human beings."

She accused members of religious parties of trying to transform Iraqi women into "second-class citizens".

During the January 30 assembly elections, the interim constitution required that one-third of parliament members had to be women.

The new constitution will also give Iraqi women married to foreign men the right to have Iraqi citizenship.

- INDEPENDENT