Iraqi Sheik Struggles for Votes  Against Tradition
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In a region famed for its dates and poets, Sheik Adnan Aidani confronts a constellation of religious and political forces that hold sway in Iraq's fiercely traditional countryside and that may prove decisive in Sunday's election for parliament.
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For Shatha al-Musawi, a Shiite member of Parliament, the urge to reconcile is being blacked out by distrust, disappointment and visceral anger.
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As Iraq's Jan. 30 election nears, Kurds threaten a boycott unless the return of the city becomes an option.
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Iraq's main Shi'ite alliance, fresh  from winning landmark elections, gathered Monday to choose a  candidate for prime minister and the allies it needs after  failing to win an absolute majority.
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As parties haggle over candidate lists, radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr fights for a top spot.
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The top vote-getters in Iraq's national elections huddled Monday to bargain over posts in the next government, and Kurdish parties appeared in a pivotal position to install the first president of their ethnic minority in Iraq's history.
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MANAMA, Bahrain -- Friction between Sunni and Shiite Muslims in this strategic Persian Gulf kingdom, which is holding its second parliamentary elections in three decades, has clouded the voting set here for Saturday.
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Among the fault lines that define Sunday's vote for an Iraqi parliament, the divide between religious and secular is one of the most decisive.
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The legitimacy of Iraqi election is likely to hinge on voter turnout by the Sunni minority.
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The US government is under pressure from political opponents on whether Iraq's poll can be held as planned.
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BAGHDAD, Nov. 27 -- Iraq's Shiite Muslim parties and the religious leadership headed by Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani on Saturday rejected a demand by other communities for a delay in nationwide elections scheduled for Jan. 30, in an escalating dispute that magnifies the country's ethnic and sectarian fault lines.
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Iraq chose January 30 for its first democratic election in decades today, but violence in Sunni Muslim areas underlined the challenge of holding polls on time.
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Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq's  most powerful religious leader, has expressed concern that  nationwide elections could be delayed and may withhold his  support in protest over the planned vote, the New York Times  reported on Thursday.
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Iraq's elections will be legitimate if roughly half the Sunni Arab minority votes despite threats of violence, a leading politician in the Shi'ite alliance expected to dominate the polls said on Saturday.
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A sectarian split is a risk in Iraq's Jan. 30 election.
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Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi vowed to stick to plans to hold an election in January 2005 even though the US and Britain are struggling to keep order in the nation.
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Iraq chose Jan. 30 for its first democratic election in decades on Sunday, but violence in Sunni Muslim areas underlined the challenge of holding polls on time.