It seems there has been a strong turnout and less than expected bloodshed during the Iraqi constitutional referendum vote. The Washington Post is reporting a total of 20 deaths from ten seperate incidents. This compares with 44 dead from nine attacks during the January elections which may be a sign that Iraqi security forces are stronger or may be a sign that US troops, having done this once before, were better able to anticipate what might occur.
tens of thousands of Iraqi police, Iraqi Army troops and U.S. and coalition soldiers manned checkpoints, surrounded polling stations and patrolled streets. Iraq declared a four-day holiday around the referendum, closing schools and government offices and shuttering many shops.
Iraq also sealed its borders, closed Baghdad International Airport, threw a nightcurfew across the entire country and banned all private vehicles from driving on the roads on election day, leaving Iraq's 15.5 million registered voters to walk to polling centers if they wanted to cast a ballot.
However, a total of 450 people were killed in the 19 days before the referendum.
Either way, Sunni voting is described as excepionally strong while Kurd and Shia voting was "brisk, but appeared lower than in January". The major exception is the city of Ramadi, a Sunni stronghold, where "the continuous crackle of gunfire kept streets there empty and lead to a 10 percent voter turnout".
according to U.S. Army officials in Salah Aldin, an overwhelmingly Sunni province north of Baghdad, by 11:30 a.m., more than 33,000 had already voted in the town of Baiji, 22,000 in Awaj, 17,000 in Tikrit and 20,000 in Samarra. Voting in Samarra was so heavy that polling places ran out of ballots in the early afternoon, officials said, and more were brought in under U.S. support.
Sunni voters in the area interviewed by reporters were nearly unanimous in saying that they had voted against the constitution, which many Sunnis believe is deeply flawed.
In Tikrit, the home town of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, about 20 Iraqi policemen were the first to vote at a polling station they were responsible for protecting.
"This constitution was written by the occupation and will never change anything in the country," police Lt. Col. Amir Abdul Karim said, explaining his no vote.
Elsewhere in town, Iraqi Army Lt. Mahmoud Nadhum urged his colleagues to reject the charter "because it calls for separation and sectarianism," he explained to a reporter. "We don't want this constitution because we want a unified Iraq."
And herein lies the present danger - if Sunnis, including Army and police servicemen, manage to veto the constitution then the whole process is set back to January again and must be repeated - with horribly predictable results in loss of confidence in the democratic process, the government and peaceful protests. After al, Sunnis are being asked to vote for a constitution that is markedly against their interests on trust that amendments to that constitution will be made at a later date and agreed by those who framed the document so prejudicially in the first place. That's a big thing to ask. Even if, as seems likely, the constitution is approved if a sizeable percentage of Sunnis vote "no" then there will be a basis for further entrenchment of positions, further polarization and ongoing sectarian violence.
No-one should expect this vote to solve Iraq's ills, no matter how it turns out. As to the vote itself, we won't know for a few days.
Meanwhile, The NY Times (and oh boy, am I loathe to cite them!) reports that things are getting messier on the Iraq-Syria border:
A series of clashes in the last year between American and Syrian troops, including a prolonged firefight this summer that killed several Syrians, has raised the prospect that cross-border military operations may become a dangerous new front in the Iraq war, according to current and former military and government officials.
This in addition to heightened pressure on Syria from the ongoing Harriri investigation which has identified several Syrian intelligent members as complicit as well as accusations of Syria actively aiding Iraqi insurgents. The NY Times report claims:
Our policy is to get Syria to change its behavior," said a senior administration official. "It has failed to change its behavior with regard to the border with Iraq, with regard to its relationships with rejectionist Palestinian groups, and it has only reluctantly gotten the message on Lebanon."
The official added: "We have had people for years sending them messages telling them to change their behavior. And they don't seem to recognize the seriousness of those messages. The hope is that Syria gets the message."
And the London Times says that the US "has offered Syria’s beleaguered President a “Gaddafi deal” to end his regime’s isolation if Damascus agrees to a long list of painful concessions."
One can only hope that the Bush administration's strategy is "rattling the cage" rather than preparing for some new military adventurism.
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