Iraqi parties yesterday geared up for the start of tough negotiations on forming a national unity government after rebels launched a series of attacks to coincide with the release of election results.
Meanwhile, a kidnappers' deadline expired with no word on the fate of US reporter Jill Carroll, whose parents have appealed to captors to spare her life.
Political parties yesterday had 48 hours to appeal the results of the Dec. 15 elections after the electoral commission on Friday released final, but uncertified figures following a month-long investigation into allegations of fraud, which led to the cancellation of less than 1 percent of the ballots.
The elections were marked by voting along ethnic and sectarian lines, with the ruling Shiite religious-based United Iraqi Alliance, which includes Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari's Dawa Party and Abdel Aziz Hakim's Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, winning 128 of parliament's 275 seats.
The Kurdish Alliance came second with 53 seats, while a variety of Sunni Arab parties, who had only a handful of members of parliament in the outgoing assembly, more than tripled their representation to a total of 58 seats in the new parliament, to be known as the Council of Representatives.
The US, Britain and the UN all welcomed the results of the parliamentary elections.
US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack stressed that Washington wanted majority Shiites, Kurds, Sunni Arabs and others to "work together in cross-sectarian, cross-ethnic efforts to think about forming a government."
"The Iraqi people will be looking to them to form an effective, responsible government that responds to their needs and a government that is responsive to all Iraqis, regardless of ethnic group or religious group," he said.
The spokesman sought to play down deep divisions between Iraq's religious and ethnic communities, saying "identity politics" were the result of [former Iraqi president] Saddam Hussein's repressive rule.
"That's really a vestige of Saddam Hussein's era where he ruled by dividing and conquering," he said.
In Baghdad, it was expected that a number of parties, including some of the Sunni-based factions which had earlier complained of fraud, would appeal the election results to a judicial commission which will have two weeks to rule on the matter before final results are certified and parliament can meet.
But politicians were already gearing up for negotiations on forming a coalition government with the majority Shiites and their Kurdish allies most likely to be calling the shots.
Meanwhile, in the latest violence, five members of the Iraqi president's staff were wounded when a roadside bomb struck their motorcade north of Baghdad, police said yesterday, adding that President Jalal Talabani was not present.
Lieutenant Colonel Abbas Mohammed al-Bayati said the bomb went off as the convoy entered the town of Tuz Khurmatu, 70km south of the northern oil city of Kirkuk late on Friday. A presidential spokesman declined to comment.
Police said an adviser to Talabani was among the wounded, but the extent of his injuries was not known. The convoy had been heading to Baghdad from Kurdistan when it was attacked. Talabani is a Kurd.
Within minutes of the election results being released on Friday, rebels launched mortar attacks on two US bases in the insurgent stronghold of Ramadi, causing minor injuries among US soldiers.
Meanwhile, a delegation from the Council on American-Islamic Relations was due in Baghdad yesterday to appeal for the release of Carroll, abducted in Baghdad on Jan. 7 by gunmen who shot dead her interpreter.
Sunni Arab leaders in Iraq and Muslims around the world pleaded for her release on Friday, hours before the expiration of a deadline set by kidnappers.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS