Overseas Iraqis start registering for elections

Iraqi expatriates began registration Monday for the upcoming election in their war-torn country.

More than 75 registration and polling stations are opened for overseas Iraqis in 14 countries across the Middle East, North America, Europe and Australia.

The International Organization for Migration (IOM), a Geneva-based non-profit organization, is supervising the out-of-country vote program.

A total of 1.2 million Iraqis abroad are expected to register for the poll, said the IOM. Iraqis living abroad can register from Jan. 17-23 and cast their ballots at the same stations during Jan.28-30 period.

More than 1,000 Iraqis in Australia were the first to register, said the IOM.

In Jordan, 11 registration stations in the cities of Amman, Irbid and Zarqa opened at 0800 local time on Monday.

"I wish the voting process will be carried out in security," said an Iraqi before his registration.

In Syria, a massive public campaign has been launched and public gatherings have been held with Iraqi communities in Damascus and other cities.

More than 300,000 posters have been printed and distributed in Iraqi communities and almost 200 billboards have been set up across Syria, as well as a blanket advertising campaign on radio, television and in print media.

Iraqis living in Syria have shown enormous enthusiasm for the elections, said Luis Martinez-Betanzos, head of the Iraq Out-of-Country Voting Program in Syria.

The IOM expects up to 150,000 people to vote in Britain and up to 600 volunteers are recruited to help for the week at voting centers in London, Manchester and Glasgow.

Iraqis in Germany lined up Monday to register at four sites across the country, with officials estimating that about 12,000 nationals of the 80,000-strong Iraqi community would be eligible to vote.

About 80,000 Iraqis are expected to register in the Swedish cities of Stockholm and Gothenburg, but organizers in the capital said some Iraqis might find it hard to produce the required two pieces of identification because they lost their papers while fleeing there.

Iraqis in Spain, Italy and Switzerland will have to travel to Paris to vote where a voting center has been set up for the estimated 8,000 Iraqis hoping to cast ballots.

In the United States, which led the Iraqi war, about 240,000 Iraqis are eligible to vote, according to the IOM. Many Iraqis said they were determined to travel hundreds of kilometers to vote.

The Iraqi polls on Jan. 30 will pick a 275-member national assembly, which in turn generates a transitional government and writes a permanent constitution.

Source: Xinhua