Safety woes mean most observers of Iraq vote will work in Jordan

UNITED NATIONS -- Most international specialists assessing the fairness of Iraq's elections will monitor the Jan. 30 vote from the safety of neighboring Jordan, but a few observers will head to Baghdad and perhaps other Iraqi cities if security permits, UN and other officials said yesterday.

Specialists putting together the international team made clear it will not conduct the usual on-the-ground election monitoring with hundreds of foreign observers in Iraq such as was recently seen in Afghanistan. Instead, it will be assessing the vote based on more than a dozen different criteria.

"We believe we can run a very effective operation to assess how well-run the election was even if there are not huge numbers of electoral observers on the ground," said Canada's chief electoral officer, Jean-Pierre Kingsley, who hosted a meeting in Ottawa this week of international election specialists to discuss the Iraqi vote.

The countries agreeing to participate in the International Mission for Iraqi Elections include Albania, Britain, Canada, Indonesia, Mexico, Yemen, and the Association of Central and East European Election Officials, Kingsley said yesterday.

Australia also will participate, UN and other officials said on condition of anonymity.

Most foreign specialists will be based in Amman, Jordan, the officials said, but the international mission will have staff in Baghdad who will be in contact with key players in the Jan. 30 election -- including the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq overseeing the vote, political parties, the government, civil society groups, and Iraqi election observers.

Kingsley declined to provide any details about the international mission's deployment. "We will be very careful deploying people in known hazardous situations," he said. "We have not ruled out going into Iraq or parts of Iraq."

The deteriorating security situation in Iraq has prompted calls for the elections to be delayed beyond Jan. 30, but the United States has maintained that the vote, which will select an assembly to draft Iraq's new constitution, should go on as scheduled.

The United Nations continues to appeal for international observers, since it cannot determine the fairness of an election it helped organize. "The presence of international observers adds an extra layer of credibility to any electoral process," UN election chief Carina Perelli said.