Hospital patients, prison detainees and security forces were voting yesterday at the start of elections for a full-term parliament set to restore full sovereignty to war-torn Iraq nearly three years after the US-led invasion.
Three days before the rest of the country goes to the polls in the watershed vote, Iraqis being treated in hospitals, those being held in prisons and members of the security forces were casting their ballots.
Draconian security measures, similar to those enforced during two earlier elections this year, have been imposed to keep attacks at bay and minimize bloodshed during Thursday's main event.
Airports and borders will shut from tomorrow until Friday or Saturday, curfews extended and a ban on carrying weapons imposed for even those with permits. A five-day public holiday will also be in effect.
"We are hoping for a calm day as during the referendum," Interior Minister Bayan Jabr Solagh said.
A vote on the country's new constitution on Oct. 15 passed without the spectacular suicide bombings that have become Iraq's trademark.
The special polling booths opened at 7am yesterday and were to close at 5pm, electoral official Farid Ayar confirmed.
In the northern Kurdish city of Sulaimaniyah, 19,800 hospital patients, detainees and security forces had registered to vote in 499 special polling booths, said Sheikh Latif, a local electoral commission official.
This week's election marks a new beginning for Iraq following the chaos of a lightning drive to oust Saddam Hussein, two transitional governments and the adoption of a constitution in October.
When the dust settles on the inevitable political horse trading, Iraqis will be left with a four-year parliament capable of carving out a new direction for the country, which is teetering on the tightrope of inter-communal tensions.
Moves toward democracy, marked by well-organized ballots and determined turnout, are a cornerstone of US policy in the Middle East with Washington increasingly focused on an ultimate exit strategy from Iraq.
But the success of the election and future prospects of stability hinge on turnout among the fallen Sunni elite who boycotted the Jan. 30 election for a transitional parliament, Iraq's first free vote in half a century.
Iraq's 15.5 million voters will elect a 275-member assembly from around 7,000 candidates in the first full-term legislature since former president Saddam Hussein's regime fell in April 2003.
The 228 political entities that have presented candidates are roughly double the 111 groups that contested the initial poll in January.
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