Iraqi voters defy the bombers

Baghdad - Millions of Iraqis defied a surge of bombings and suicide attacks yesterday to go to the polls in greater than expected numbers for the first democratic elections for 50 years. The electoral commission's provisional estimate of turnout was 57%.

Despite an extraordinary security crackdown in which all cars were banned from the streets and most roads were blocked by soldiers and coils of razor wire, more than 40 Iraqis were killed in attacks.

At least nine suicide bombers, most with explosives strapped to their chests, detonated themselves near polling stations in Baghdad. Several other targets were hit by mortars and explosions echoed across Baghdad throughout the day, but still crowds of Iraqis turned out to vote.

Speaking from the White House after the polls had closed, President Bush said: "The world is hearing the voice of freedom from the centre of the Middle East. By participating in free elections, the Iraqi people have firmly rejected the anti-democratic ideology of the terrorists."

Tony Blair called the elections a "blow right to the heart of global terrorism" and called on people - whatever their views about the invasion - to embrace the results.

In a statement from Downing Street, Mr Blair said anybody observing the elections where democracy was taken for granted would see it as a "moving and humbling experience".

Numbers from the Shia Muslim community in southern Iraq and the Kurds in the north were particularly high. In Sunni areas in central Iraq the picture was mixed. Several particularly violent Sunni towns saw few voters, with reports that some polling stations did not open. Residents in other Sunni areas said that higher than expected numbers went to the polls.

Iraqi election officials initially put turnout at 72% but later admitted it was a crude estimate and said perhaps 8 million out of Iraq's 14 million eligible voters had taken part, a turnout closer to 57%.

The results and the official turnout will not be known for at least 10 days. But shortly after the polls had closed an official from the party leading a powerful Shia coalition said, as expected, that their surveys suggested the coalition had come out ahead. "According to our public opinion surveys in all the provinces, we won," said Ammar al-Hakim, the son of Abdul Aziz al-Hakim who leads the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq.

The party heads an alliance of Shia religious parties known as the United Iraqi Alliance which has been tacitly endorsed by Iraq's leading Shia cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

Many voters in Baghdad's Shia districts and in Shia cities across the south did indeed appear to cast their ballots for the Shia alliance and many mosques called on the faithful to vote for the list.

"Every honourable, decent Iraqi wants to help his country and now we can decide our destiny by ourselves and eradicate terrorism," said Saed Hamza, 29, a businessman who voted for the Shia list in Jadriya, in central Baghdad. He had brought 11 of his relatives two days ago from a more dangerous part of town so they could vote in safety.

But there also appeared to be strong support for Ayad Allawi, the U.S.-appointed prime minister. "This is a historic moment for Iraq, a day when Iraqis can hold their heads high because they are challenging the terrorists and starting to write their future with their own hands," Mr Allawi said as he cast his vote inside the heavily fortified Green Zone in Baghdad.

The attacks began on the eve of the election when a rocket hit the U.S. embassy inside the zone for the first time, killing two Americans and injuring five others. Then yesterday began with a wave of bomb attacks in the hours after the polls opened. Several policemen were killed in separate attacks across western Baghdad.

In one of the worst incidents, a suicide bomber walked on to a minibus in the Shia town of Hilla, south of Baghdad, and killed at least four other people.

A group led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a wanted Jordanian militant, claimed responsibility for most of the bombings in statements released on the internet. But the Iraqi government claimed that the strong turnout suggested the insurgency was losing ground.

One Iraqi election monitoring group, the Tammuz Network, said that in the town of Diwaniya, in the south, leaflets were handed round threatening voters who did not choose the Shia list. It found four polling centres in Suleikh, in Baghdad, which appeared to be under the control of members of the Shia parties.

Another team of international election monitors, operating from Amman, Jordan, said the poll appeared to meet international standards.

"Certainly, as a starting point where one considers from where the Iraqi people are coming ... this is very good, this is a very good process," said Jean-Pierre Kingsley, Canada's top election official and the chief of the International Mission for Iraqi Elections.

In Washington, the new U.S. secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, said the election was "not perfect" but had been "going better than expected".

"What we're seeing here is the voice of freedom," she said.

Kofi Annan, the UN secretary general, said the vote was the "first step" towards democracy. "It's a beginning, not an end," he said.

The newly elected parliament is to write a new constitution for Iraq which must be approved by a referendum later this year ahead of a second national election before the end of December.

Voters were electing candi dates for a 275-seat national assembly, which will in turn elect a president of Iraq and two deputies who will select a prime minister and cabinet. It will be the first time since the war that Iraqis will have had an elected government and it should signal a change in the relationship between the Iraqi state and the U.S. occupation forces. All the leading Iraqi candidates are demanding the Americans set a timetable for the withdrawal of forces. -- Guardian News

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