An aide to Iraq's foremost Shiite cleric said the spiritual leader might issue a religious edict rejecting a US-backed government if his demands for direct elections are ignored.
The warning came Thursday as tens of thousands of Shiite Muslims rallied in Basra to protest a US-backed formula for choosing Iraq's new legislature.
The turnout in Basra, 550km southeast of Baghdad, estimated by British soldiers at up to 30,000, was the biggest protest organized by Shiite clerics against the power transfer plan.
Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani and other clerics wield vast influence among Iraq's Shiites, believed to comprise about 60 percent of the country's 25 million people.
"The large crowd before you today are expressing their feeling that they don't want anything imposed on them," said cleric Ali al-Mussawi al-Safi, al-Sistani's representative in Basra. "We want to affirm our rights. We want elections in all political domains."
The US wants regional caucuses to choose a new parliament, which will then select an Iraqi administration. It says security is too poor and voter records too incomplete for fair elections.
Instead, the Nov. 15 agreement provides for parliament members to be selected in 18 regional caucuses. The legislature would then choose a new, sovereign administration to take office by July 1.
The clerics want direct elections, fearing the caucuses may be rigged to keep Shiites out of power.
The US is also wary of elections because of who might win. With Iraq in turmoil, Islamic radicals or Saddam Hussein's Baath party might dominate a vote simply because they have the best organizations.
Protesters, virtually all of them male, chanted, "Yes, yes to elections! Yes, yes to al-Sistani!" Later, they sat on the pavement listening to robed and turbaned clerics rail against the US plan.
Faced with al-Sistani's objections, US administrator Paul Bremer left Baghdad for Washington on Thursday for consultations with US President George W. Bush and his senior national security advisers.
A Chinese aircraft carrier group entered Japan’s economic waters over the weekend, before exiting to conduct drills involving fighter jets, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said yesterday. The Liaoning aircraft carrier, two missile destroyers and one fast combat supply ship sailed about 300km southwest of Japan’s easternmost island of Minamitori on Saturday, a ministry statement said. It was the first time a Chinese aircraft carrier had entered that part of Japan’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ), a ministry spokesman said. “We think the Chinese military is trying to improve its operational capability and ability to conduct operations in distant areas,” the spokesman said. China’s growing
Nine retired generals from Taiwan, Japan and the US have been invited to participate in a tabletop exercise hosted by the Taipei School of Economics and Political Science Foundation tomorrow and Wednesday that simulates a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan in 2030, the foundation said yesterday. The five retired Taiwanese generals would include retired admiral Lee Hsi-min (李喜明), joined by retired US Navy admiral Michael Mullen and former chief of staff of the Japan Self-Defense Forces general Shigeru Iwasaki, it said. The simulation aims to offer strategic insights into regional security and peace in the Taiwan Strait, it added. Foundation chair Huang Huang-hsiung
PUBLIC WARNING: The two students had been tricked into going to Hong Kong for a ‘high-paying’ job, which sent them to a scam center in Cambodia Police warned the public not to trust job advertisements touting high pay abroad following the return of two college students over the weekend who had been trafficked and forced to work at a cyberscam center in Cambodia. The two victims, surnamed Lee (李), 18, and Lin (林), 19, were interviewed by police after landing in Taiwan on Saturday. Taichung’s Chingshui Police Precinct said in a statement yesterday that the two students are good friends, and Lin had suspended her studies after seeing the ad promising good pay to work in Hong Kong. Lee’s grandfather on Thursday reported to police that Lee had sent
A Chinese ship ran aground in stormy weather in shallow waters off a Philippines-controlled island in the disputed South China Sea, prompting Filipino forces to go on alert, Philippine military officials said yesterday. When Philippine forces assessed that the Chinese fishing vessel appeared to have run aground in the shallows east of Thitu Island (Jhongye Island, 中業島) on Saturday due to bad weather, Philippine military and coast guard personnel deployed to provide help, but later saw that the ship had been extricated, Philippine navy regional spokesperson Ellaine Rose Collado said. No other details were immediately available, including if there were injuries among
RSS