In a meeting at the Kurdistan Parliament on April 19, the Women’s Rights Committee decided to submit MERI’s Draft Amendment Law on Combating Domestic Violence to the Speaker of Parliament. The meeting was attended by MERI’s President, representatives of Directorate General of Combating Violence Against Women from the Ministry of Interior, members of Judicial Council, High Council for Women’s Affairs and legal experts. Discussions focused around the draft amendment which was prepared after six months of deliberation by MERI experts in close collaboration and engagement with various stakeholders in the Kurdistan Region.
Following an extensive debate, the meeting reached a consensus on editing some sensitive sections of the Draft Amendment before submitting the draft to the Chair of the Parliament for the first reading.
On the sidelines of the meeting, MERI President Prof. Dlawer Ala’Aldeen met the Speaker of Kurdistan Parliament Dr. Yosuf Muhammad Sadiq. In the meeting, discussions the importance of the draft amendment of the CVAW legislation, in addition to the importance of close collaboration between MERI and the Parliament on policy research and supporting the process of nation-building and institutionalisation in Kurdistan Region.
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About MERI: The Middle East Research Institute is Iraq’s leading policy-research institute and think tank. It is an independent, entirely grant-funded not-for-profit organisation, based in Erbil, Kurdistan Region. Its mission is to contribute to the process of nation-building, state-building and democratisation via engagement, research, analysis and policy debates.
MERI’s main objectives include promoting and developing human rights, good governance, the rule of law and social and economic prosperity. MERI conduct high impact, high quality research (including purpose-based field work) and has published extensively in areas of: human rights, government reform, international politics, national security, ISIS, refugees, IDPs, minority rights (Christians, Yezidis, Turkmen, Shabaks, Sabi mandeans), Baghdad-Erbil relations, Hashd Al-Shabi, Peshmarga, violence against women, civil society. MERI engages policy- and decision-makers, the civil society and general public via publication, focused group discussions and conferences (MERI Forum).