Iraq: Thanks but no thanks to US

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Naaa nothing to see here, please move on

Iraq Rejects U.S. Talk of Adjusting Vote Result

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/nm/20041226/ts_nm/iraq_election_dc

By Luke Baker

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq (news - web sites)'s election body rejected a suggestion in Washington it adjust the results of next month's vote to benefit the Sunni minority if low turnout in Sunni areas means Shi'ites win an exaggerated majority in the new assembly.


Speaking of "unacceptable" interference, Electoral Commission spokesman Farid Ayar said: "Who wins, wins. That is the way it is. That is the way it will be in the election."


U.S. diplomats in Baghdad, at pains to keep their role in the election discreet, declined comment on a New York Times report from Washington which said Sunnis might be granted extra seats if the community's vote was judged to have been too low.


U.S. officials have expressed concern that if the ballot on Jan. 30 fails to reflect Iraq's sectarian and ethnic mix due to violence and boycotts in Sunni areas, then the assembly will lack legitimacy. But any attempt to fix the proportion of seats going to the main groups in advance could have the same effect.


"The Americans are expressing their views and those aren't always the same as the Commission's," Ayar told Reuters.