Shiites Lead in Partial Results; Violence Resumes

BAGHDAD —  Violence in Iraq has surged after a postelection lull, authorities said Thursday, as partial results from six of Iraq’s 18 provinces show the powerful Shiite Muslim ticket linked to the nation’s leading ayatollah making a strong run for seats in the transitional national assembly.

Electoral officials said they were investigating allegations of voting irregularities, but they defended the election’s integrity. A makeup election for those who did not participate Sunday is not an option, officials said.

Early returns indicate that the United Iraqi Alliance, backed by the nation’s senior Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, is ahead in the six provinces, five of which are in the predominantly Shiite south.

Most observers expect the Shiite slate of candidates to place first, possibly winning more than 50% of the seats in the assembly.

Iraq’s Shiites represent about 60% of the population. The clerical establishment stressed the importance of voting, and turnout was high in the south, where violence is much less pronounced than in the Sunni Muslim heartland of central and northern Iraq.

The Shiite slate also was far ahead in the partial returns from Baghdad, with 2 1/2 times more votes than the closest challenger, the slate headed by interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi. The other slates were far behind.

Electoral administrators discouraged forecasts based on results from just 10% of Iraq’s more than 30,000 polling stations. More than 14 million Iraqis were eligible to vote Sunday, officials said, but the official turnout figures weren’t expected for at least a week.

“These preliminary numbers do not represent something you can build your predictions on,” said Safwat Rashid of the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq, which is overseeing the vote.

Violence across Iraq appeared to diminish in the two days after the election, but reports of attacks resumed Wednesday. U.S. and Iraqi officials had said that there would be an upturn in violence.

Two Marines reportedly were killed Wednesday night in Al Anbar province in the west. Early today, the military reported a soldier killed in action in northern Babil, just south of Baghdad.

A roadside bomb unsuccessfully targeted the governor of Al Anbar, Associated Press reported. Two men were found dead in Ramadi, the provincial capital.

The grisliest incident occurred late Wednesday outside the northern city of Kirkuk, where insurgents ambushed a minibus carrying Iraqi army recruits. Twelve recruits were killed and two were seriously injured, Maj. Gen. Anwar Mohammed Amin said.

Insurgents seeking to oust U.S. forces consider Iraqi security forces collaborators and have killed hundreds of them. Militants attacked a police station in Samawah in southern Iraq on Thursday, killing one officer, and ambushed convoys around Baghdad, killing five officers and a national guard major.

Much of the world has praised election, despite allegations of irregularities.

The electoral commission has dispatched a team to investigate claims that many people could not vote in Nineveh, a Sunni province in the north.

Several parties have charged that technical deficiencies, such as a shortage of ballots and polling places, contributed to a low turnout among Sunnis, who were dominant during the rule of Saddam Hussein. Some Christians, Kurds and other minorities in the diverse Mosul area also have complained of being unable to vote.

But electoral officials said insurgent threats and calls from Sunni clerics and political leaders to boycott the vote may have been the major factors keeping Sunni turnout low.

The relative calm on election day led many Sunnis to belatedly reconsider their boycott, officials said.

“When the people saw that the process was going smoothly, they asked for the opening of more voting places,” said Ezzuddin Mohammedi, an electoral commissioner. “But it was not possible for us to open more centers on the same day.”

The partial returns released Thursday are the first official results. Political observers here soon began poring over the numbers in search of trends.

Preliminary numbers from overseas voting showed the Shiite slate associated with Sistani narrowly finishing first among Iraqis voting in the United States, with almost 32% of the vote. The Al Rafideen National List, a Christian slate, was a close second, with almost 29%. Christians, a tiny minority in Iraq, represent a disproportionate percentage of Iraqi expatriates living in the U.S. Allawi’s slate was fifth, after the Kurds and Communists.

The preliminary results released from the United States and other foreign voting venues cover all of the foreign ballots cast. But, an official explained, the results will not be final until Iraqi electoral authorities certify them.

Voting among Iraqis in the United States and 13 other countries attracted considerable media attention. But overseas ballots accounted for a fraction of the overall vote.

About 280,000 Iraqi expatriates worldwide registered to vote, officials say, and almost 94% of them cast ballots.