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From The Associated Press
BLOOMINGTON — The United States and its allies made mistakes when invading Iraq, but overthrowing Saddam Hussein was the right thing to do, the Iraqi ambassador to the United Nations said.
Indiana University Law School graduate Feisal Istrabadi told law students Monday that the allies made a mistake in justifying the invasion by claiming that weapons of mass destruction were in the country. They also erred by dissolving the Iraqi security forces and turning “the liberation of Iraq into the occupation of Iraq,” he said.
But the discovery of graves of thousands of Iraqis thought to be executed by Hussein’s government made it clear to him the invasion was the right thing to do, he said. He said no one wants the U.S. military to stay in Iraq indefinitely, but setting a deadline for a pullout would be a mistake.
“It is absolutely necessary for the multinational forces to remain in Iraq until the Iraqi forces can maintain security,” he said.
Istrabadi spent part of his childhood in Iraq, but moved with his family to Bloomington, where he grew up and graduated from high school. In April 2003, after U.S. forces ousted Hussein, he left his Valparaiso law practice to return to Iraq as an adviser to Iraqi nationalist leader Adnan Pachachi.
In a brief news conference and a speech at the IU Law School, he talked about the new Iraqi constitution, which includes rights for women, official status for the Kurdish language and a careful balancing of Islam’s role.
An independent judiciary and a ban on torture were included over objections from the U.S.-led provisional authority, he said. A permanent constitution is scheduled to be drafted by Aug. 15 and put to a vote Oct. 15, he said.
He also said that although the Iraqi election was not perfect, it was still significant that a nationwide vote could take place less than two years after Hussein’s ouster.
“The fact that it occurred and that it had fairly high turnout – 60 percent, almost – is itself a sign of success,” he said.
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