A combination picture shows the key candidates for Iraq's parliamentary election. From L-R: (top row) Adnan al-Oachachi of the secular Iraqiya bloc, former prime minister Iyad Allawi, former prime minister Ibrahim Jaafari, member of parliament Humam Hamoudi, tribal leader Sheikh Ahmed Abu Risha, Second Vice President Tareq al-Hashimi, Shi'ite politician Ahmed Chalabi, (middle row) Interior Minister Jawad al-Bolani, member of parliament Jalal al-Deen al-Saghir, member of parliament Mowaffaq al-Rubaie, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani, President Jalal Talabani, member of parliament Hadi al-Amiri, (bottom row) member of parliament Mithal al-Alusi, government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh, Finance Minister Bayan Jabor, parliament speaker Ayad al-Samarrai, leader of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council Ammar al-Hakim, Kurdish leader Masoud Barazani, and First Vice President Adel Abdul Mahdi. REUTERS/Staff
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There were hundreds of politicians and scores of political groups running to fill the 325-seat parliament. Despite the explosions, millions of Iraqis exercised their right to vote. As the Americans have already found out, no-one is able to threaten or intimidate the fatalist Iraqis.
It was easy for me not to vote for the likes of Dr Ayad Allawi, a former Saddam associate, a killer, who collaborated with the Americans to massacre thousands of people in Falluja when he was the US-appointed Prime Minister in 2004. He also claimed to have worked for 13 different foreign intelligence services. As an Arab I never vote for the Kurds with pro-USraeli agendas and who want to fragment Iraq. Being vehemently against the Americans and their agents, I had to vote for those who were calling to unify Iraq in one single entity free from the dirty boots of American soldiers. In this regard, there are two political fronts that openly call for a total withdrawal of US forces; one lead by religious people and the other by seculars. I voted for the seculars, albeit they didn’t have the necessary funds to promote their campaign similar to those candidates financed by the Americans, the Iranians, the Saudis and the Pigs of the Gulf. Many expect the status quo to continue. That is, a client regime serving the American interests for an additional four years and a fierce armed resistance until the last American soldier leave the country.
No nation accepts to be occupied let alone by uncivilised and trigger-happy American cowboys supported by criminal mercenaries. No matter who is going to win the Iraqi election under the American occupation, the heroic armed resistance will continue.Let Genral Paetrieus and his crimianls military gangs go and drink the sea. Traq will be free.
Iraq was destroyed, its people killed and the Americans expect Iraqis to keep quiet in order to be civilised! I wonder how would the Americans react if Iraqis did the same to them and in their own country? I am fully convinced that the Americans are sheer political Zombies. Do you think that the USraeli terrorists are civilised? Do you think that the Iraqis will forget the 'shock and awe bombardement' and what has happened at Abu Gharib? The list is too long. If the USraelis are civilised then I hate to see the uncivilised Moghuls.
All those who make the ultimate sacrifice in defence of their nations, homes and families are considered as heroes to me. The battle right now is between the Iraqi nationalists and the uncivilised Americans and their agents. All those Iraqis who support the occupiers are considered as traitors regardless of their religion and ethnic background.
The lowest percentage of voting in a developed country is in America, where the so-called democracy is highly-manipulated by power centres. In Iraq, those true nationalists and educated democrats can't compete with the foreign agents. Dr Allawi alone had over 1$billion allocated to his campaign or more than what President Obama has spent to win the 2009 election.
Adnan Darwash, Iraq Occupation Times
Radical Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, arrives to attend a news conference in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, March 6, 2010. Anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, in a surprise news conference on the eve of the Iraqi election, has urged his followers to turn out and vote.
(AP Photo/Fars News Agency, Hamed Malekpour)
Twelve killed in explosion at building in Iraq
07 Mar 2010 06:16:10 GMT
Source: Reuters
BAGHDAD, March 7 (Reuters) - At least 12 people were killed and eight wounded after an explosion destroyed a second building in Baghdad as Iraq held a parliamentary election on Sunday viewed as crucial to cementing peace and stability.
A first explosion at a residential building in the Iraqi capital killed at least four people as periodic blasts from mortar rounds or roadside bombs rumbled across the city after voting centres opened. (Writing by Michael Christie; Editing by Missy Ryan)
By HAMZA HENDAWI and QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA, Associated Press Writers Hamza Hendawi And Qassim Abdul-zahra, Associated Press Writers – 16 mins ago
BAGHDAD – Iraqis voted Sunday in an election testing the mettle of the country's still-fragile democracy as insurgents killed eight people across the capital with a barrage of mortars intent on disrupting the day.
About 19 million Iraqis are eligible to vote in the election which will determine who will lead the country as U.S. forces go home and whether the country will be able to overcome the jagged sectarian divisions that have defined Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.
Insurgents who vowed to disrupt the elections — which they see as validating the Shiite-led government and the U.S. occupation — launched a volley of mortar attacks just as polls opened across the city and country.
Four people died when two mortar shells landed in a neighborhood in northeastern Baghdad, and another four were killed in western Baghdad, also in a mortar attack, police and hospital officials said. There were also explosions elsewhere in the country, but no further reports of fatalities.
An Associated Press photographer on the scene of the attack in Baghdad's northeastern Ur neighborhood described rescuers pulling bodies from the two-story building that collapsed, but police prevented anyone from filming or taking pictures.
Insurgents also launched mortars toward the Green Zone — home to the U.S. Embassy and the prime minister's office — and in the Sunni neighborhood of Azamiyah police reported at least 20 mortar attacks in the neighborhood since day break.
Yet voters still came. In Hurriyah, a Shiite neighborhood in northwestern Baghdad, loudspeakers in mosques exhorted people to turn out to vote — like "arrows to the enemy's chest."
About 6,200 candidates are competing for 325 seats in the new parliament, Iraq's second for a full term of parliament since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion seven years ago this month.
Many view the election as a crossroads at which Iraq will decide whether to adhere to politics along the Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish lines or move away from the ethnic and sectarian tensions that have emerged since the fall of Saddam Hussein's iron-fisted, Sunni minority rule.
Iraqis hope it will help them achieve national reconciliation at a time when the United States has vowed to stick to President Barack Obama's timetable for the withdrawal of combat forces by late summer and all American troops by the end of next year.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is fighting for his political future against a coalition led by mainly Shiite religious groups — the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council and a party headed by anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. He also faces a challenge from secular alliance led by former a secular Shiite, Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, who has teamed up with a number of Sunnis in a bid to claim the government.
"These acts will not undermine the will of the Iraqi people," al-Maliki said Sunday morning, speaking to reporters after casting his ballot.
Security was tight across the capital where only authorized vehicles were allowed on the streets and voters headed to the ballot box on foot. The borders have been sealed, the airport closed and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi military and police have flooded the streets.
Extra checkpoints were set up across the city, and in some parts of central Baghdad, people could not go 50 yards (meters) without hitting another checkpoint.
In keeping with the U.S. military's assertion that Iraqis will run these elections, the only visible American military presence was a lone helicopter hovering over central Baghdad.
The U.S., which has lost more than 4,300 troops in the nearly seven-year conflict, has fewer than 100,000 troops in the country — a number that is expected to drop to about 50,000 troops by the end of the summer.
Exiting the polls, Iraqis waved purple-inked fingers — the now-iconic image synonymous with voting in this oil-rich country home to roughly 28 million people.
At one polling place in Baghdad's Karradah neighborhood, barbed wire ringed a school, armed guards stood around the perimeter, and police scanned voters with metal detectors.
Despite the violence and frustration that has set in after years of fighting and faulty government services, many Iraqis were still excited to vote.
In a mostly-Sunni enclave called Zubair, near the southern port city of Basra, Jaman Khalf lined up with his family at the polling center starting at 6:30 a.m. He was the first person there to cast his ballot.
"We have come here looking for change. We hope that Iraqis will elect qualified people who will save us from the miserable situation we are living in," he said.
In the Shiite holy city of Najaf, south of Baghdad, dozens of voters also lined up to cast their ballot.
"We came to participate in this national day, and we don't care about the explosions," said Sahib Jabr, a 34-year-old old taxi driver.
President Jalal Talabani was among the first to vote Sunday morning in the Kurdish city of Sulamaniyah. Talabani's party, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, is enmeshed in a tight race with an upstart political party called Change which is challenging the two Kurdish parties that have dominated Iraqi politics for years.
"I call on the Kurds and on all Iraqi people to turn out because it is a decisive election," Talabani said, speaking after casting his ballot.
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Associated Press writers Katarina Kratovac, Hamid Ahmed, Saad Abdul-Kadir, Bushra Juhi, and Sameer N. Yacoub contributed to this report.
Iraq lifts car ban during vote hit by attacks
07 Mar 2010 08:01:03 GMT
Source: Reuters
BAGHDAD, March 7 (Reuters) - An Iraqi security official said authorities had lifted a ban on car traffic in central Baghdad on Sunday less than four hours into a parliamentary election rocked by scores of rocket, bomb and mortar attacks.
Baghdad security spokesman Major General Qassim al-Moussawi gave no reason for lifting the ban on private cars, which had been implemented to protect voting stations from bomb attacks, but said the restrictions still applied to buses and trucks. (Reporting by Ahmed Rasheed; Writing by Michael Christie; Editing by Rania El Gamal)
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FACTBOX-Security developments in Iraq, March 7
07 Mar 2010 14:31:02 GMT
Source: Reuters
March 7 (Reuters) - Following are security developments in Iraq at 1430 GMT on Sunday. * Denotes new or updated items
*BAGHDAD - Twenty-five people were killed and 20 wounded in a blast at a block of flats in northeastern Baghdad in the Ur neighbourhood, an Interior Ministry source said.
BAGHDAD - Four civilians were killed and 12 wounded in an explosion at a block of flats in southwestern Baghdad, the same source said.
BAGHDAD - Dozens of mortar rounds landed in Baghdad in several locations -- wounding three civilians in the western district of Jihad, wounding two in northern Baghdad, wounding one civilian in western Baghdad, and wounding five more in the western districts of Mansour, Jamiaa, and al-Furat. Other mortar rounds landed near a school used as polling centre in western Baghdad, near a mosque in the northern district of Adhamiya, and near a polling centre in the western district of Ghazaliya, without causing casualties. Three mortar rounds landed on the Green Zone government and diplomatic compound.
BAGHDAD - 20 mortar shells were launched on Baghdad's southern district of Doura without causing any reported casualties.
BAGHDAD - Roadside bombs exploded in northern Baghdad, in western Baghdad, in the southeastern suburb of Madaen, near a polling centre in the western district of Khadra, and near a polling centre in Jihad, killing at least four people and wounding 16.
BAGHDAD - Katyusha rockets killed at least four people and wounded 16 after being fired into the northern district of Qreiat and the northwestern neighbourhood of al-Hurriya. All the information on the incidents in Baghdad came from the Interior Ministry source.
*FALLUJA - Seventeen mortar rounds landed in Falluja, some near a polling centre, wounding two policemen and four civilians, a police source said. Falluja is 50 km (35 miles) west of Baghdad.
FALLUJA - A roadside bomb exploded in western Falluja without causing any casualties, the police source said.
*MAHMUDIYA - One person was killed and 11 people were wounded in two mortar attacks in the town of Mahmudiya, 30 km (20 miles) south of Baghdad, the Interior Ministry source said.
YUSUFIYA - One person was wounded in a mortar attack in the town of Yusufiya, 20 km (12 miles) south of Baghdad, the source said.
MOSUL - A roadside bomb went off near an Iraqi army checkpoint close to a polling station, wounding two soldiers, in western Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
MOSUL - A hand grenade thrown at a polling station wounded seven people in eastern Mosul, police said.
MOSUL - A mortar round landed near a polling station causing no casualties in eastern Mosul, police said. The police detonated two bombs placed near polling stations, police added.
KIRKUK - Two roadside bombs went off in two different towns near the city of Kirkuk, without causing casualties, police said. Kirkuk is 250 km (150 miles) north of Baghdad.
MOSUL - A joint patrol of Kurdish peshmerga fighters and Iraqi soldiers, supervised by U.S. troops, opened fire on the convoy of a provincial council member in a town near Mosul, wounding him and two of his bodyguards. Police said the incident was caused by a misunderstanding.
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