- The United Nations today indicated that elections are
unlikely to take place in Iraq before 2005 - despite demands for an early
poll by religious and political leaders.
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- The country's leading Shia cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali
al-Husseini al-Sistani, has led calls for elections to be held by June
30 this year - when the US occupying powers are due to hand power back
to the Iraqis.
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- However, the UN said today that consensus was growing
that the country will not be ready for elections then - although a handover
of power to some form of interim government should still go ahead.
-
- Frank Eckhard, spokesman for UN Secretary General Kofi
Annan, said: "Everyone expects elections in 2005. The question is
what can be done before 30 June and if it can't be elections what other
way can you find to establish a legitimate government."
-
- His comments followed talks between the ayatollah and
a UN delegation, led by envoy Lakhdar Brahimi.
-
- A spokesman for Mr Brahimi said: "He (Mr Sistani)
seemed to accept the fact that three and a half months or whatever were
not sufficient to arrange and conduct elections ... Everything we have
seen up until now indicates that it is unlikely that this country will
be able to organise elections by that date."
-
- He said it was not a question of delaying the handover
from the coalition-appointed governing council to elected representatives,
but of "finding a new timetable".
-
- "Elections will take place when the country is ready
and that will be after the handover of power," the spokesman told
the BBC, adding: "You need to put certain things in place before you
can organise elections. There is a legal framework to be put in place,
there's a political consensus that has to be reached before you can start
the process of managing and organising an election."
-
- Coalition authorities are also concerned that the security
situation in Iraq - where two suicide bombings in the last week killed
more than 100 people - is too unstable for election until next year.
-
- Washington is likely to welcome the fact that the UN
appears to have won Mr Sistani's backing for later elections, but it remains
unclear how an interim government will be formed.
-
- Mr Sistani has criticised the US administration's plans
for a series of regional caucus meetings to transfer power to an Iraqi
authority when troops start to pull out this summer.
-
- The ayatollah has described the US plan as undemocratic,
and wants an interim constitution to be approved by the elected legislature,
rather than the US-picked governing council.
-
- Mr Annan is expected to give his recommendations on the
election process before the end of the month.
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- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2004
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- http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1147692,00.html
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