Niza: Successful lobby on Dutch policy on fragile states
Niza / Fatal Transactions, in collaboration with the Dutch NGO Cordaid has published a position paper on the Dutch fragile states policy on fragile state. The paper was used by the Dutch socialist party (SP) to formulate parliamentary questions to the Minister of Foreign Affairs. In this paper, Niza and Cordaid stress the role of natural resources as being one of the main causes for instability in African countries. The position paper contains 6 general recommendations for natural resource management and 3 specific recommendations for dealing with conflict resources in the case of Eastern Congo.
The Dutch Minister Verhagen of Foreign Affairs and the Dutch Minister Koenders of Development Cooperation have recently published their policy strategy document on fragile states: Security and Development in Fragile States – Strategy for Dutch implementation 2008-2011. In this policy document, the Dutch government labels Congo as one of their target countries, because of its potentially destabilizing influence in the Great Lakes Region. However, the policy document does not mention the role of the (illegal) trade in natural resources as one of the main causes of fragility in the DRC, nor does it acknowledge the potential of natural resources for economic growth and sustainable development. Niza and Cordaid have argued that this is a dangerous gap in the Dutch policy. By ignoring natural resources as a potential threat to fragile states, such as the DRC, the ongoing conflict can never be properly tackled.
Niza and Cordaid wish to continue this debate by organising a multi stakeholder dialogue in mid April in Den Haag, The Netherlands. For this expert meeting, policymakers, Dutch parliament members, academics, experts with NGO’s and representatives of the corporate sector will be invited. Main goal is to come up with a number of clear policy recommendations in the field of transparency, due diligence procedures and corporate initiatives for fingerprinting of natural resources.
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