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| 29 November 2004 | Monday | 16 Shawwal 1425 |
Iraq polls appear on target
BAGHDAD, Nov 28: Iraq's January polls looked set to take place as planned, although ongoing violence on Sunday did nothing to alleviate the security concerns of political parties seeking a delay.
A car bomb exploded on Baghdad's airport road, while US patrols in Mosul recovered their grim daily crop of bodies as insurgents continue to intimidate the population in the northern city ahead of the elections.
The headquarters of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan party in western Mosul was attacked by gunmen in a car, a security official said. Guards fired back, wounding one of the attackers.
The car bomb on the road leading to the airport in Baghdad, wounding two soldiers and damaging a military vehicle, the US military said in a statement. US forces, backed by British and Iraqi troops, regained control of the town of Latifiyah, which had been a no-go zone for months and earned the nickname of "Fallujah's second name".
Several parties on Friday demanded that the elections be postponed by six months because the security conditions were not met. But most of the relevant authorities rejected the idea and said everything would be done to hold the elections on January 30, as scheduled.
"Postponing the elections is out of the question," electoral commission chairman Abdel Hussein al-Hindawi said on Saturday after examining a request submitted a day earlier by 17 organisations. -AFP
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