Iraqi expats pouring in to vote

2005-01-30 11:32

Amman - As people in Iraq defied insurgent threats and voted Sunday in their country's first independent election in five decades, Iraqis living in Jordan streamed into polling stations to cast their ballots in the last day of overseas voting.

By Saturday, more than 60% of some 21 000 Iraqis registered to vote in Jordan had cast their ballots in 11 polling stations across the kingdom, according to officials of the International Organisation of Migration, which is handling elections outside Iraq.

"This is a clear and loud message that Iraqis inside and outside are united in defeating terrorism," said Mansour Ibrahim as he entered a polling station in the upscale Suwfiya neighbourhood in Amman.

Outside the voting centre, candidate Malik Abdul Hussein Ghafouri and several supporters campaigned as voters arrived. Security was tight; Jordanian police searched voters as they passed through metal detectors.

"I promise to work to build an Iraq for all Iraqis," vowed Ghafouri. His supporters gave out pens and cigarette lighters to voters as they passed posters promoting the parties of interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi and interim President Ghazi al-Yawer.

More than two-thirds of the 281 000 Iraqis who had registered to vote outside Iraq had done so since expatriate voting began Friday, said Sarah Tosh, a spokesperson for the Out-of-Country Voting Programme.

Overseas voting in Jordan, Syria, Iran and the United Arab Emirates as well as 10 other countries around the world wraps up Sunday.

There was even a sizable turnout in the desert village of Zarqa, the hometown of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a leading militant in the Iraqi insurgency. Hundreds of people cast their ballots there Sunday, election officials said.

- AP