Early balloting begins in Iraq; 2 officers killed
Although gunmen fired on a polling site, most places were calm. Sunnis expect to gain.
BAGHDAD - Soldiers, police, prisoners and hospital patients cast ballots yesterday in a run-up to provincial elections that are intended to redistribute power across Iraq and help quell sectarian and ethnic strife.
The early balloting ensured that security forces are available for duty Saturday, when the rest of Iraq's voters will choose from among 14,467 candidates for 440 council seats.
About 15 million people are registered to vote in the election, which officials hope will redress inequities resulting from the last balloting in 2005. Most Sunnis boycotted that vote, leaving even Sunni-dominated regions under control of Shiite Muslims and Kurds and exacerbating ethnic and sectarian tensions.
"It most certainly contributed to many Sunnis falling into violent temptation," the special U.N. representative to Iraq, Staffan de Mistura, said of their decision to disenfranchise themselves four years ago.
This time the Sunnis are taking part, and if the results are widely accepted and the vote is deemed fair, de Mistura said, it would be a sign that Iraqis have left violence behind.
"It is the curtain-raiser to see whether we are moving really from bullets to ballots in Iraq," he said.
One act of violence marred what otherwise appeared to be a calm day of voting and underscored military officials' reminders that insurgents remain active. Gunmen fired on a polling site being used for special voting in Tuz Khurmatu, about 135 miles north of Baghdad, killing two policemen. The gunmen escaped, Police Lt. Farhad Abdullah said.
Areas to the north and south of Baghdad are considered the most likely to experience violence during or after the voting because of the bitter battles for control of the land and resources and continuing insurgent activity.
In northern Nineveh province, where Kurds dominate the provincial council, Sunni Arabs who sat out the last vote are expected to make a strong showing because of their large population. The Kurds' loss of control could exacerbate tensions in Nineveh, where violence has increased in recent months as other areas of the country enjoy relative stability.
Arkan Jassim, a 25-year-old policeman, said he cast his ballot Tuesday in the province for a candidate from the Sunni Arab nationalist Hadba slate. "I think it will reduce the influence of Kurds," Jassim said, reflecting the ethnic tensions.
Jassim Mohammed, a spokesman for the Electoral Commission in Nineveh, said turnout among special voters there was 85 percent.
In southern provinces, the battle lines are drawn between rival Shiite parties vying for influence in oil-rich Basra and other Shiite-dominated areas. In March, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki launched a military offensive against militiamen loyal to anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in Basra. Maliki is hoping his Dawa Party will reap the benefits of that offensive with a win over the rival Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, or SIIC - a victory that would bode well for him in national elections this year.
At a polling site for police in the southern city of Basra, officer Maitham Hasan said he had selected a Dawa candidate. "I voted for the slate that made Basra safe from criminals," Hasan said.
Participation in Diyala province north of Baghdad, where al-Qaeda in Iraq remains active, was more than 95 percent among security forces, said Maj. Ghalib Hamdi, a provincial police spokesman. Hamdi said he had voted for a secular candidate. Capt. Ahmed Abdul Majeed, a policeman in the provincial capital of Baqubah, said he also supported a secular candidate.
"I believe he is a patriotic personality who thinks seriously and transcends secularism," Majeed said.
