Hospitals, prisons join in casting first ballots

Starting Tuesday, curfews, restricted travel will be in place across the country.
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Voting begins today in hospitals, military camps and even prisons across Iraq, launching the process to choose a new parliament that the United States hopes can help quell the insurgency so U.S. forces can begin heading home.
Iraq's government announced it will close its borders, extend the nighttime curfew and restrict domestic travel starting Tuesday -- two days before the main election day -- to prevent insurgents from disrupting the vote.
"We are very prepared for the elections, and we are highly determined," Interior Minister Bayan Jabr said. "We hope that everyone participates and that it will be a safe day. ... We are at a historic juncture."
Voters will be choosing their first fully constitutional parliament since the 2003 collapse of Saddam Hussein's rule. The 275-member assembly, which will serve for four years, will then choose a new government that U.S. officials hope can win the confidence of the disaffected Sunni Arab minority -- the foundation of the insurgency.
Early voting
Although most of the 15 million eligible voters will cast ballots Thursday, soldiers, police, hospital patients and prisoners not yet convicted of crimes can vote today starting at 9 a.m.
Officials said Saddam -- who is jailed and facing trial for the deaths of more than 140 Shiites in 1982 -- has the right to vote, but it was not known whether he would.
Suspected insurgents held in U.S. or Iraqi detention but who have not been convicted of an offense would also be eligible, Iraqi officials said.
On Tuesday, the estimated 1.5 million Iraqi voters living outside the country can begin casting their ballots over a two-day period at polling centers in 15 countries, including the United States, Canada and Australia.
Voters must produce a passport, certificate of citizenship or military service papers and dip an index finger in indelible purple ink to prevent them from voting more than once.
With security so tenuous, campaigns have been waged primarily through media advertisements, colorful banners and placards on the streets, and press conferences before audiences packed with supporters.
High hopes for Sunnis
Most attention has focused on Sunni Arabs, who largely boycotted the Jan. 30 election, to protest the continued U.S. military presence.
With most Sunni Arabs staying home, Shiites and Kurds won more than 220 of the 275 parliamentary seats -- a move that sharpened communal tensions and fueled the Sunni-dominated insurgency.
This time, more Sunni Arab candidates are in the race, and changes in the election law to allocate most seats by province instead of based on a party's nationwide total all but guaranteed a sizable Sunni bloc in the next assembly.
U.S. officials hope that a big Sunni turnout and a strong Sunni bloc in the new parliament will help curb the violence so the United States and its coalition partners can begin drawing down their forces in 2006.
An American soldier was killed Sunday by a roadside bomb in Baghdad, the U.S. command said. That brought to at least 2,142 the number of U.S. military members who have died since the war began, according to an Associated Press count.
Expectations
Even with a big Sunni vote, Shiites are expected to win the biggest share of parliamentary seats. Shiites form an estimated 60 percent of Iraq's 27 million people compared with 20 percent for the Sunni Arabs.
On Sunday, Iraq's leading Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, issued a binding religious decree, or fatwa, instructing followers to vote for candidates "who can be trusted to protect their principles."
Al-Sistani also urged Shiites to avoid "splitting the vote and risking its waste" -- an admonition apparently directed against former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite running on a ticket with several prominent Sunnis.
Copyright 2005 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.