U.N. team in Iraq to settle vote question

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- A U.N. team began its mission in Iraq on Saturday to study prospects for early legislative elections opposed by the United States but demanded by the powerful Shiite Muslim clergy.

The Sunni Muslim president of Iraq's Governing Council, however, insisted the U.N. findings will not be binding on the Iraqi leadership, reflecting divisions among Iraqis over how to restore an independent government by July.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan announced the arrival of the team, saying experts would begin "intensive consultations" with Iraqi leaders and members of the U.S.-led coalition and listen to the views of all Iraqi constituencies.

"I hope the work of this team will help resolve the impasse over the transitional political process leading to the establishment of a provisional government for Iraq," Annan said in a statement issued in New York.

Annan did not say how long the team, led by Carina Perelli of Uruguay, would remain in Iraq, but a senior Iraqi official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said members would be here about 10 days.

They were expected to travel to the holy Shiite city of Najaf to meet Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani, whose demand for early elections threatens to torpedo U.S. plans for transferring power to Iraqis by July 1.

The United States and the Iraqi Governing Council sought Annan's help to overcome objections by the Iranian-born cleric. The Americans want members of the interim legislature to be chosen by regional caucuses. The legislature will in turn name a government to take power from the U.S.-led coalition by July.

Al-Sistani demands that the legislature be elected in a direct vote. The 75-year-old cleric also has said he would accept the recommendations of the U.N. experts.

However, many leading Sunni Muslims fear an election under U.S. occupation would produce a government dominated by majority Shiites, who were suppressed for generations by Iraq's Sunni Arab minority.

Mohsen Abdel-Hamid, a Sunni Muslim who assumed the rotating Governing Council presidency on Feb. 1, told reporters Saturday that "we are not bound by the findings" of the U.N. delegation, echoing remarks late last week by another prominent Sunni, Adnan Pachachi, who held the presidency in January.

Abdel-Hamid, who heads the fundamentalist Iraqi Islamic Party, said the Governing Council would be "guided" by the U.N. team's findings but he final decision "rests with the council in consultation with the coalition."

When an Iraqi reporter expounded at length on al-Sistani's views about early elections, Abdel-Hamid angrily interrupted him and snapped: "Are you asking a question or giving us a lecture?"

U.S. administrator L. Paul Bremer, who appointed the council seven months ago, can veto council decisions.

However, failure to resolve the impasse with al-Sistani would throw the Bush administration's Iraq policies into disarray during an election year and could stoke sectarian tensions in a country already ravaged by terrorism and an insurgency.

As a sign of the tensions brewing here, Pachachi bristled last month when asked if he would be carrying a message from al-Sistani to Annan during a meeting in New York. "We are not the ayatollah's proxies," he said.

U.S. officials insist that the American timetable for handing power to the Iraqis by July 1 remains on track, and Abdel-Hamid said that regaining sovereignty by that date was "very important to Iraqis."

Despite the two Sunnis' view, senior Shiite politician Abdel-Aziz al-Hakim, a Governing Council member, told The Associated Press that findings of the U.N. experts would be binding since they will work together with Iraqi experts.

"Only if the Iraqi and the U.N. experts fail to reach a consensus on the issue will the decision be left to the Governing Council," said al-Hakim, an associate of al-Sistani. Al-Hakim said delaying the July 1 deadline for a short period of time would be acceptable.

U.S. officials have cited the precarious security situation, the absence of accurate voter rolls and lack of an updated election law in opposing an early ballot.

However, the Americans cannot afford to alienate al-Sistani, who commands enormous respect among Iraq's Shiites, who compromise an estimated 60 percent of the population. Many Sunnis challenge that figure.

Shiite leaders, however, say their demand for a direct vote comes from their conviction that an election is the best and most reliable way to reflect the will of the Iraqi people.

In Cairo, Egypt, an Arab League report obtained Saturday by the AP accuses the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq of threatening the country as well as regional stability by empowering Kurdish and Shiite Muslim groups.

The report, drawn up by an Arab League delegation that visited Iraq in December, reflects fears among Arab countries that a post-Saddam Hussein government would give a large amount of authority to Kurdish and Shiite Muslim groups, and that those minority groups in neighboring countries would be inspired to rise up and demand more power.

The report does not name the country's Shiites but uses the term "sectarianism" to refer to Shiite and Kurdish political aspirations.

As a subsitute for voter rolls, Al-Sistani's aides have suggested using data collected for a nationwide food ration system introduced in the 1990s with the help of the United Nations.

The political plan signed Nov. 15 by Bremer and the council provides for three direct votes in 2005 -- one to choose delegates who will draft a permanent constitution, another to ratify the document, a third to elect a new parliament.

That plan replaced one abandoned in November when al-Sistani objected to the drafting of a new constitution for Iraq by unelected delegates.