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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: kumar who wrote (156330)	1/15/2005 8:01:33 AM
From: Noel de Leon	Respond to of 281500

"UN now backs elections in Iraq Sistani's clout increases as world body supports his call for elections over US plan for transfer of sovereignty. By Matthew Clark \| csmonitor.com The United Nations has opted to support calls from one of the main leaders of Iraq's Shiite Muslim community for early elections. The move to back Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani's insistance on one-person-one-vote over the US plans to hand back sovereignty took place amid heavy security in the wake of two recent suicide bombings that killed nearly 100 Iraqis. In a nod to Sistani's rising influence, UN diplomat Lakhdar Brahimi announced the decision after a two-hour visit to the reclusive cleric's home in the holy Shiite city of Najaf, 90 miles south of Baghdad. Mr. Brahimi said that Sistani "is insistent on holding the elections and we are with him on this 100 percent because elections are the best means to enable any people to set up a state that serves their interest." Brahimi leads a UN team that is in Iraq to assess the feasibility of holding the early direct elections that Sistani has been urging in opposition to the US plan of holding regional "caucuses" to elect an interim government by June 30. Under the plan, the interim government would not hold direct elections until 2005. The team will have its work cut out for them. As The Los Angeles Times reports: [The UN team] must sound out competing Iraqi interests and find a way to select a government that all sides find legitimate. They must do it without appearing to take sides, and they must not let the UN be forced into a role that is larger than it is willing and able to handle. It is this highly-charged environment that made Brahimi reluctant to go to Iraq after two years of nation-building in Afghanistan, reports the Times. 02/11/04 Media knocked for Iraq war coverage 02/10/04 The 'Al Qaeda' memo, Zarqawi, and civil war in Iraq 02/09/04 US image abroad will 'take years' to repair Sign up to be notified daily: Find out more. Sistani has refused to meet with US officials, including Bremer, and demands that an elected legislature - rather than the US-picked Iraqi Governing Council - approve a temporary constitution still being drawn up. Sistani's calls for direct elections, which he has been making regularly since last June, seemed largely to fall upon deaf ears until he mobilized followers for massive demonstrations last month in the southern city of Basra and in Baghdad. But when tens of thousands of angry protesters marched through the streets chanting "Yes, yes to elections; no, no to selection," followed by Sistani's statement that the protests could turn violent if elections were not held within months, everyone listened. The same week as the first protest in Basra, the head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, Paul Bremer, was in meetings in Washington trying to hash out a response to Sistani's calls. Bremer then went to the UN, hat in hand, to ask for a team to assess the feasibility of early elections in Iraq. Analysts speculated then that the US expected the UN to legitimize its assertion that early elections could not be held and that Sistani would likely accept a UN decision. During Bremer's meeting with Kofi Annan nearly a month ago, the BBC reported that "the US hopes that a UN stamp of approval would halt criticism from the Shia community." According to The New York Times, "Mr. Brahimi's statement this morning makes it more difficult for the White House to stick to its original plan and persuade the Iraqi people of its plan's legitimacy." Just how the announcement will affect the US plans and timetable is not yet clear. In his comments, Brahimi did not address the important question of whether or not the elections could be held by June 30, the Times points out. He gave no timetable. US officials have long maintained that early elections are impractical because of the lack of stability and lack of a voter roll. But, Hussain Al-Shahristani, who was held in solitary confinement for 10 years under Saddam Hussein, writes in The Wall Street Journal that "impeding the legitimate demand for direct and fair elections would further aggravate ethnic and sectarian tensions." UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan is expected to give his opinion on the elections Feb. 21, reports Reuters. " After a google on Elections in Iraq UN