Jordan's King: Iraq Elections Impossible

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040928/ap_on_re_eu/france_jordan&cid=518&ncid=1480


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Abdullah, who met with President Jacques Chirac in Paris on Tuesday, told the daily Le Figaro that it "seems impossible to organize indisputable elections in the chaos of Iraq today," but he noted that Iraqi interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi is determined to go ahead with the vote, scheduled for late January.


"If elections take place in the current disorder, the best organized faction will be the extremists," Abdullah said. "The results will reflect this advantage of the extremists. In such a scenario, there will be no chance that the situation gets better."


U.S. and Iraqi officials have insisted that election be held on time, though Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has acknowledged that some areas may not be able to vote because of the escalating violence.


Abdullah said he was worried that that would mean the Sunni Arab minority — which lives in the most dangerous parts of Iraqi — could be left out of the voting. "I very sincerely hope that security will improve and that the elections will be able to take place. But in the entire territory of Iraq," he said.

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