The former Labour MP for Cynon Valley Ann Clwyd, who has died aged 86, blazed a trail in pursuit of human rights for all those whose causes she adopted during a long life of passionate political advocacy. Her first campaigns were close to home on behalf of the mining industry in her native Wales, and she would later become strongly identified with sympathy for the Kurdish people of Iraq.
Her commitment to their case and opposition to the brutal regime of Saddam Hussein led to her remarkable speech in the House of Commons in early 2003 in support of the proposed war against Iraq, despite the widespread opposition on the Labour party left, with whom she was customarily associated. The then prime minister, Tony Blair, subsequently appointed her as his special envoy on human rights in Iraq, a post she held until the fall of the Labour government in 2010.
