Iraq’s election commission sends most election results to Supreme Court for approval

Partial Iraqi election tallies sent for approval

BAGHDAD — Iraq’s election commission announced Sunday it will send all results of the March vote to the Supreme Court for final ratification except for those from Baghdad, where a recount is under way.

Patience has been wearing thin over the delay in announcing final results more than two months after the close March 7 parliamentary election.

“The court sent a message to the commission about the possibility of ratifying results and the decision of the commission is to send all election results except Baghdad,” said Qassim al-Abboudi, the election commission spokesman.

The votes from Baghdad province are being recounted after allegations of fraud by Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, whose coalition narrowly came in second to secular Shiite politician Ayad Allawi, whose Iraqiya bloc was heavily backed by minority Sunni Arabs.

Al-Abboudi said the decision also follows a request from al-Maliki to ratify the results aside from Baghdad. President Jalal Talabani and his two deputies made a similar request on Tuesday.

Also on hold are results for special party compensatory seats, Christian seats and those whose winners are being vetted for links to Saddam Hussein’s regime by a Shiite-led panel.

Iraq’s political parties have made little progress toward forming a new government since the vote more than two months ago, partly due to ongoing challenges against the results and questions over the eligibility of some candidates.

The two main Shiite parties have formed an alliance and are now disputing the right of Allawi’s Iraqiya bloc, which won the most seats, to form the next government.

A spokesman for the government of the autonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq said Sunday that all Kurdish parties are uniting into a single electoral bloc to negotiate with the Arab parties to form a new national government.

The Kurds have already indicated they would be interested in joining a coalition with their traditional Shiite allies.

The two main Kurdish parties and several smaller groups, including the upstart Goran, or Change, Party will together control 57 seats in the national parliament.

CORRECTS size of new Kurdish alliance.