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Thank you Attila for the update. I think that these decisions may be difficult to make, as they require balancing two factors that may be in opposition to each other: 1. a desire not to co-operate with an illegal and globally unpopular war. 2. a desire not to abandon Iraq, now that that war has taken place. On this latter point, I found Alan Kuperman's 16 April article in USA Today worrying. He notes that: "during instability in places such as Northern Ireland, Malaysia, Bosnia and Kosovo, intervention forces have required approximately 20 troops per thousand residents to maintain order. Postwar Iraq will likely fall in the latter category. ... Given Iraq's population of about 24 million, that could mean 480,000 peacekeepers..." While I certainly do not want to see a US occupation of Iraq, I also do not want to see Iraq rend itself as Yugoslavia did. Best, Colin Rowat work | Room 406, Department of Economics | The University of Birmingham | Birmingham, B15 2TT, UK | web.bham.ac.uk/c.rowat | (+44/0) 121 414 3754 | (+44/0) 121 414 7377 (fax) | c.rowat@bham.ac.uk personal | (+44/0) 7768 056 984 (mobile) | (+44/0) 7092 378 517 (fax) | (707) 221 3672 (US fax) | c.rowat@espero.org.uk > Dear Friends, > > Hungarian parliament is scheduled to vote on Monday about the US > request for Hungary to send peacekeeping troops to Iraq. > Authorizing the government to grant the request requires a two > thirds majority. The coalition propose to say yes. > > I spoke to my MP on Friday afternoon, and he said that they (the > two opposition parties) had made up their minds to vote against > the proposal. > > In the meantime, however, state radio and TV keep repeating that > the opposition will only reveal their decision on Monday. > > Keep your fingers crossed for my small country to dare be defiant. > > Cheers > Attila Boros > Hungary _______________________________________________ Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk