Blank Iraqi ballots seized on truck from Iran

AFP: Hundreds of thousands of blank ballots like those to be used in this week’s Iraqi elections have been found on a tanker truck which entered the country from neighbouring Iran, security officials said Tuesday.
BAGHDAD, Dec 13 (AFP) – Hundreds of thousands of blank ballots like those to be used in this week’s Iraqi elections have been found on a tanker truck which entered the country from neighbouring Iran, security officials said Tuesday.

“A truck with Iranian number plates was intercepted Tuesday night in the locality of Badra, Wasset province, southeast of Baghdad,” an official said.

Another security source confirmed the discovery and said authorities were looking for three other suspect trucks in areas east of Baghdad near the Iranian border.

“The blank ballots were probably destined to stuff the ballot boxes” in Thursday’s general election, a security official said.

The ballot papers were not printed by the Iraqi Electoral Commission which is the only body authorised to supply voting materials.

Iraqis go to the polls Thursday for the third time this year to elect a 275-member Council of Representatives that will form the basis of the first permanent post-Saddam Hussein government.