Michael Howard in Sulaimaniya Tuesday December 28, 2004 The Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1380191,00.html
Iraq's largest mainstream Sunni Muslim party pulled out of the election race yesterday, saying the violence plaguing areas north and west of Baghdad made a "free and fair vote" on January 30 impossible. "We are withdrawing," said Mohsen Abdel Hamid, leader of the Iraqi Islamic party, as he announced the latest setback to plans to stage the country's first credible elections.
"We are not calling for a boycott, but we said we would take part only if certain conditions had been met and they have not," he said.
The moderate Islamist party wanted the poll postponed by up to six months, hoping that huge security problems and a lack of public awareness about the vote in Sunni Arab-dominated areas could be rectified.
The party has emerged as the most moderate political group among the Sunni population. It had a seat on the now defunct governing council and was part of the interim government.
Although conservative Sunni clerics have urged an election boycott, the Iraqi Islamic party has until now backed the poll and submitted a large list of candidates. "I am fully with the ideas of elections, but the security situation does not make it possible for Sunnis to vote," Mr Abdel Hamid said.
The move increases pressure on Iraq's interim government and its US backers to delay elections for a 275-seat transitional assembly to create a permanent constitution for Iraq.
Last night militants linked to al-Qaida attempted to exploit growing doubts about mounting a representative election in Iraq. In an audiotape received by al-Jazeera, a man purported to be Osama bin Laden endorsed Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi as his deputy in Iraq and called for a boycott. Al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian, leads a group called al-Qaida in Iraq, which is responsible for numerous car bombings and beheadings of foreign hostages in Iraq.
Ensuring fair representation of Iraq's once all-powerful Sunni minority - which comprises about 20% of the population - is seen as crucial to Iraq's future stability. One of Iraq's most prominent Sunni political figures, Adnan Pachachi, has warned that voter turnout could be just 5% in places where the insurgents appear most entrenched.
A western diplomat in Baghdad said: "The effective disenfranchisement of the Sunni Arabs could have dire consequences for the political security of Iraq. We can't afford to marginalise the Sunnis even further. It will do nothing to stem the rising tide of factionalism and sectarianism."
The Bush administration is reportedly looking at ways to guarantee Sunni politicians seats in the national assembly, as well as a senior office of state.
But Iraq's interim leaders know any decision to delay or skew the result could alienate leading figures among the Shia majority, including Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. "We are damned if we go ahead, and damned if we delay," said an Iraqi minister who requested anonymity. He said the government appeared to be "in a state of flux" over the timing.
An aide to the ayatollah said: "[Sistani] does not want a delay in the election. The Iraqi people have been waiting for too long."
He played down concerns that a Sunni boycott would deny the election legitimacy: "If some people decide not to participate then they cannot claim that the elections are illegitimate. We cannot be held hostage by the Ba'athists and the Sunni terrorists."
Abdulrazak al-Khadimi, a spokesman for Ibrahim Jaffari, the interim vice-president and a member of the Shia Dawa party, said: "We understand the Iraqi Islamic party has its reasons for withdrawing, but if elections don't take place on January 30 as planned, it will be a disgrace for Iraq."
In further evidence of the risks that continuing violence poses for the elections, one of Iraq's leading Shia politicians narrowly survived a suicide bomb attack outside his headquarters in Baghdad yesterday. At least 13 people died.
Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the leader of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, blamed an alliance of Islamists and Sunni Arab followers of Saddam Hussein, but urged his followers not to retaliate.