Word: hussein
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...inadequate Sunni participation. That concern for full participation in an Arab election is as touching as it is novel. Europeans have never had trouble recognizing the legitimacy of regimes in Cairo, Riyadh and Damascus, where there is no participation by anyone. Indeed, many Europeans championed the inviolability of Saddam Hussein's regime, under which election participation was routinely 100%-at the point...
...odds, the Iraqi elections transpired this past Sunday with relative success. Insurgent violence was moderate, as compared to some of the most pessimistic prognoses, and Iraqi turnout was certainly respectable. In a country that has been several times treated to the pathetic theater of sham elections—Saddam Hussein was famously “elected” with over 99 percent of the vote in 1995 and 2002—the recent success of a democratic Iraqi election is a welcome sign of hope in the troubled country. We are thus excited that the Iraqi people have passed their...
...election. Turkey's military has given notice of its intention to challenge the election's outcome in Kirkuk, the oil-rich northern city coveted by Kurdish nationalists as the future capital of a Kurdish state. Turkey is unhappy that former Kurdish residents of the city forcibly relocated by Saddam Hussein and replaced by Arab Iraqis two decades ago will be allowed to vote in Kirkuk. Turkey - as well as leaders of the city's ethnic Turcoman and Arab populations - fear this will decisively tip the electoral balance to give the Kurds control over the contested city. The Turkish military...
...Initially, the plan had been to hand power to returning exiles after toppling Saddam Hussein. When the exiles proved too unpopular, the U.S. then sought to have its handpicked Iraqi Governing Council write the new constitution. Even after the IGC proved incapable, the Bush administration consistently rejected Sistani's demand for democratic elections. Instead, U.S. administrator J. Paul Bremer proposed, that a constitution-making body be appointed by a series of caucuses comprising handpicked elites around the country. Sistani was having none of it. He insisted on democratic elections, used his influence among Shiites on the Governing Council to block...
...best thing in the form of maximum autonomy from Baghdad. The flashpoint, of course, comes in cities where Kurds and Arabs (and in some cases Turkmen) compete for control, none more so than Kirkuk - the mainstream Kurdish parties are claiming as their own a city forcibly "Arabized" by Saddam Hussein, setting up a clash not only with resident Arabs and Turkomen but also with neighboring Turkey which is alarmed by any manifestation of Kurdish nationalism on its border. And right now, it's difficult to see how a new government, whose makeup is not yet determined, can stop tensions...