Iraqi paper says supervising body involved in vote fraud

Iran Focus: Baghdad, Dec. 28 – A Baghdad daily accused Iraq’s Electoral Commission of having a hand in polling fraud during the parliamentary elections held earlier this month. Iran Focus

Baghdad, Dec. 28 – A Baghdad daily accused Iraq’s Electoral Commission of having a hand in polling fraud during the parliamentary elections held earlier this month.

Empty ballot boxes were replaced with boxes full of forged votes in favour of the Iran-backed Shiite coalition United Iraqi Alliance (UIA) after polling hours, according to the Assiyada daily’s Sunday edition, which quoted an Iraqi army officer present during the activity.

Observers from the Electoral Commission, many of whom belong to the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), the front-runner group within UIA, oversaw the vote fraud, the report said.

SCIRI is led by the Shiite cleric Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, who has close ties to Iran’s hard-liners.

On Tuesday, thousands of Sunnis and secular Shiites turned up and demonstrated in Baghdad against what they described as Iranian meddling in the Iraqi polls.