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Chalabi Lacks Votes Needed to Win Spot in Iraqi Assembly

 
 
Reply Wed 28 Dec, 2005 11:31 am
This is the best news re the Iraq election. Iran's agent was dumped on his ass. Bush, Cheney, Judith Miller, et al must be weeping.---BBB

Chalabi Lacks Votes Needed to Win Spot in Iraqi Assembly
By Ellen Knickmeyer and Naseer Nouri
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, December 27, 2005; A18
BAGHDAD

Unexpectedly low support from overseas voters has left Ahmed Chalabi -- the returned Iraqi exile once backed by the United States to lead Iraq -- facing a shutout from power in this month's vote for the country's first full-term parliament since the 2003 invasion.

Rebounding violence, which included bombings, assassination attempts and other attacks, claimed at least 19 lives in Iraq on Monday, including that of an American soldier. Eight members of a single Iraqi SWAT team were wiped out in what Iraqi authorities described as an hour-long shootout with better-armed insurgents.

With 95 percent of a preliminary tally from the Dec. 15 vote now completed, Chalabi remained almost 8,000 votes short of the 40,000 minimum needed for him or his bloc to win a single seat in the 275-seat National Assembly, according to election officials. Without a seat in the assembly, Chalabi would presumably be unable to obtain a post in the resulting government.

However, Chalabi was among the politicians jockeying Monday ahead of meetings that have been scheduled in the Kurdish north this week to bring Shiite Muslims, Sunni Arabs, Kurds and others into post-election talks on forming the next government.

A spokesman for Chalabi's party, which has filed complaints of election irregularities, said he was waiting for the results of the investigation. "What I can say is Dr. Chalabi will have an important role, whether in the government or outside,'' said the spokesman, Haider Mousawi.

Chalabi is regarded as both a master deal-maker and remarkable political survivor. The longtime exile and his associates played an influential role in the Bush administration's decision to invade Iraq and overthrow Saddam Hussein; U.S. authorities tapped Chalabi to lead a small Iraqi force in the U.S.-led invasion. But his reputation suffered from past financial scandals, and critics have charged he was always more popular with Americans than with Iraqis.

Chalabi's supporters here had hoped he would do well among exile voters who were allowed to cast ballots overseas. But results announced Monday showed he received just 0.89 percent of the "special vote,'' from Iraqi citizens in foreign countries, hospitals, the army and prisons. Kurdish politicians received the largest share of the special vote, with the backing of millions of Iraqi Kurdish exiles and members of the security forces, while the current governing coalition of Shiite religious parties has so far won the most votes overall.

Chalabi's bloc has done poorly across the country, according to the preliminary tally, which left it statistically unlikely that the bloc could win a seat outright. Final results are expected by early next month.

Chalabi pulled out of the governing Shiite alliance ahead of the elections, opting instead to form a small party of his own, after the alliance refused to guarantee him the top job of prime minister, his aides said at the time.

Representatives of the top finishers readied for midweek meetings to be convened under the auspices of President Jalal Talabani. With no party receiving an outright majority of seats in the new National Assembly, winning control of the next government will require forming a coalition that can command such a majority.

The deal-making has led to meetings among rivals at opposite extremes of Iraqi politics to feel out any possible alliance. On Saturday, the effort brought Saleh Mutlak -- a Sunni politician previously derided by Shiites as a front for insurgents -- together with Abdul Aziz Hakim, the leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, a Shiite religious party whose militia Sunnis accuse of running anti-Sunni death squads. Both sides confirmed the meeting Monday.

"We have agreed that we should form a government of national unity without suggesting any names," Mutlak said. "And they've agreed on the principle and were very positive about it." He said there were "no results for these talks yet, but all expectations show that we are on the right track to solve the problem."

Tariq Hashimi, secretary general of the Iraqi Islamic Party, a Sunni group, said his organization also was "negotiating with all factions, including representatives of the Shiite alliance."

Iraq's election commission said Monday it still had found no evidence of any fraud serious enough to change the outcome of the elections.

Violence Monday targeted government security forces and officials. About 25 insurgents attacked a checkpoint run by an Iraqi SWAT team outside Baqubah, about 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, said Kanan Hameed, a SWAT team member whom authorities say survived only because he was elsewhere during the attack.

"The attack lasted for one hour. We were waiting for any support from the Iraqi police or the American forces, but no one came," Hameed said.

"The men fought until they ran out of ammunition,'' said Awf Rahomi, deputy governor of Diyala province.

Baqubah, the capital of Diyala, has been the scene of Sunni protests against the election results. A roadside bombing Monday, apparently targeting the governor, wounded him and killed one of his guards, spokesman Ali Khaiyam said. A separate attack killed a female member of the provincial council, police in Baqubah said.

Armed men near Latifiyah, about 20 miles south of Baghdad, stormed the house of a Shiite family Monday and killed four men of the family in front of the women and children, a police spokesman said. Other killings Monday included the assassination of the local deputy chief of the Supreme Council party in Najaf.

In Baghdad, an American soldier on patrol was killed by a rocket-propelled grenade. Also, at least three bombs hit the predominantly Shiite Karrada district, killing at least one person.

"The resistance is doing the right thing," Uthman Abdullah, a taxi driver, said after the Karrada bombings. "They should never let the Shiites enjoy taking control of the country. The holy warriors should show them one black day after another. This is the only language that these people will understand."
==============================
Correspondent Jonathan Finer and special correspondents Omar Fekeiki and K.I. Ibrahim contributed to this report.
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stevewonder
 
  1  
Reply Wed 28 Dec, 2005 06:37 pm
Did this guy think he had a chance?
even the sad stage managed PR stunt of the US raiding hs offices and accusing him of spying for Iran didnt work.
Good plan. Didnt work.
Perhaps every dog doesnt have its day.
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BumbleBeeBoogie
 
  1  
Reply Sat 31 Dec, 2005 10:33 am
Ahmed Chabli has what he has always wanted
Ahmed Chabli has what he has always wanted, for 30 days, the control of Iraq's oil money. How sad! He is following the same tactic the Mullahs took when they took control of Iran. The control of Iran oil and its revenues. It's that control that lets them maintain political control of Iran. As Iran's agent, Chalabi now risks inflaming the dispute between the Iraqi Shiites and the Kurds, who are developing plans to retain control of the vast oil fields in their territory.---BBB

Minister goes in Iraq oil crisis
BBC
12/31/05

Iraqi Oil Minister Ibrahim Bahr al-Uloum has been temporarily released from his post amid a dispute over the government's petrol pricing policy.
He is to be replaced for 30 days by Deputy Prime Minister Ahmed Chalabi.

Mr Bahr al-Uloum had publicly objected to the Iraqi government's decision this month to raise petrol prices threefold.

Fears of severe shortages, prompted by the closure of Iraq's largest oil refinery, have led to long queues at petrol stations in Baghdad.

The refinery in the northern town of Baiji has been shut since last week following death threats to tanker drivers.

A ministry spokesman told reporters that "production in the north, centre and south is about to suffocate".

The closure has jeopardised power supplies across northern Iraq and is costing the ministry $20m (£12m) a day.

The ministry said it hoped the Baiji refinery would be back up and running within days.

"The government has relieved Bahr al-Uloum of duties for 30 days and put in charge Mr Chalabi who heads the energy council," an official told the AFP news agency.

"The decision was taken because of Mr Bahr al-Uloum's objections to the early introduction of higher petrol prices."

Petrol prices

Mr Bahr al-Uloum, the eldest son of independent Shia cleric Mohammed Bahr al-Uloum, is a petroleum engineer who previously served as oil minister in the first post-war cabinet between September 2003 and June 2004.

"I object to the decision of putting me on leave and the mechanism by which it was done after I objected to the government's decision to raise fuel prices," Mr Bahr al-Uloum told reporters late on Friday.

The Iraqi government cut subsidies on petrol earlier this month shortly before the International Monetary Fund (IMF) backed a new $685m (£395m) loan to aid its economic reconstruction.

Protests broke out throughout the country as the price of petrol tripled from 50 to 150 dinars ($0.03 to $0.10) a litre.

Although billions of dollars have been spent on infrastructure since Saddam Hussein's regime was toppled, fuel and electricity production have not reached the levels maintained before the invasion.

IRAQ'S OIL MAY 2003 - DECEMBER 2005

Estimated pre-war level of crude oil production: 2.5m barrels a day (peak).

Estimated pre-war level of crude oil export: 1.7m to 2.5m barrels a day.

Figures for September 2005 based on incomplete data and represent averages for approximately half the month.

All data as of 14 December 2005.
Source: Brookings Institute
--------------------------------------------

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/middle_east/4569360.stm

Published: 2005/12/30 17:18:39 GMT
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